Next on my audiobook listening list are three books movies I like are based on. There are two movie adaptations of Solaris. Both are high on my favorite movies list. It was time to check the source for the movies. I wish I could have experienced this without knowing anything about the movies. Movies told all the story beats. Book spend more time on them giving more background and spending more time on science. Story beats lose some impact when you know them from movies. In book they are explained better and come slower phase. Not sure which works better. This is case of wanting to experience something for a first time again.
Soderbergh concentrated on relationship of Kelvin and his wife. Science and Solaris were on background. Tarkovsky concentrated more on philosophy. Science and Solaris were there on background. For Soderbergh and Tarkovsky Solaris was setup to tell something else and show dream like visuals. Book concentrates more on contacting something so alien human mind can’t understand. I understand movie has to cut something and history of study of Solaris is easiest to cut. Tarkovsky spends more time on it before movie goes to Solaris. In movies Kelvin lose interest in science when he experiences what happens on station. In book he is still interested of science.
After listening the book it feels even weirder why Soderbergh’s Solaris had special force’s attack mentioned at the beginning. Neither book or Tarkovsky’s movie had anything like it. In both it was science station doing science. I guess American audiences needed threat of violence in their movie. It didn’t make any sense. How those scientist could have stopped special forces? Other added mention of violence added something but it wasn’t needed. Did someone say movie has to at least tell there was violence on station even if it wasn’t shown?
Tarkovsky added long beginning at Earth. It had some history of study of Solaris from the book but I assume it was there because in Soviet Union you had to hide what you really wanted to say. It probably said something about life in Soviet Union as did the added philosophy on station.
The ending. No spoilers. I think I like book’s ending the best. It doesn’t change the tone of what happened before. Tarkovsky’s ending is quite close to book’s ending. It looks good but what it adds doesn’t work as well as book’s ending. Soderbergh changed Solaris quite a bit. He used changed Solaris to give bit of action and kind of happyish end. Ending isn’t happy unless you compare it to book and other movie. One of my favorite movie scenes is where Kelvin dreams of what it would be like back on Earth. I thought that was addition to Soderbergh’s movie because it felt so much like other additions. But it was from the book. In weird way it fits better to Soderbergh’s movie than to the book. I liked Soderbergh’s ending before listening the book. After knowing how book ends the changes Soderbergh made don’t feel so good. His ending was built during the movie and made more sense before listening the book. After listening the book I wish he would have dropped the added action feel of the ending. Don’t know if studio wanted there to be some action feel or was that his choice.
I wanted to keep this post spoiler free in case you don’t know the story. It is mystery story best experienced without knowing anything about it. I like all three versions of it. Soderbergh’s version is probably easiest to absorb because it is reduced to core of the story. Tarkovsky’s movie is art movie from Soviet Union and not everyone enjoy those. The book has lot of technical description which could be hard for some listeners/readers. But all three are worth it.