Solaris

An incredibly unique take on sci-fi, a contemplative exploration of humanity and philosophy. That is Solaris. There are two lovers but one is trying to discover humanity and one is slipping away. Throughout the movie Kelvin is facing denial in accepting the planet’s apparition as his lover who died a decade before, and that apparition is trying to find humanity in themselves. What makes a human? The ability to form deep emotional bonds with each other? To think profoundly think of the world around them? This is what the movie makes you dwell on. The planet is eating away at Kelvin’s core and what makes him human, and by the end he is a husk of what once was. The planet took his ability to form deep emotional bonds and left him trying to rebuild what was stripped from him, trying to rediscover what it means to be human and to live in the world he occupies. His dead lover was a seemingly unwilling force of torment upon Kelvin. The planet is living, the ocean is alive. It is a malevolent force that picks apart its victims with their own mind. And now, Kelvin’s memories are fragments among this ocean in the form of islands. This is my interpretation, but the ending is very open-ended. This movie is due for many future rewatches.