The Fountain vs Solaris

Even though I liked The Fountain, I don’t know a single person to whom I could recommend it. The Fountain is one of those languid, dreamlike movies where the visuals are so lush, the music so chimey and relaxing, and the dialogue so warmly whispered, it’s like a giant cup of the best hot cocoa you’ve ever tasted. A giant cup of hot cocoa that takes you two hours to drink. That gets cold and has a bunch of that gross chocolate gunk in the bottom of the cup. And you spilled a little on your favorite shirt. And you’re allergic to chocolate.

See, The Fountain is visually amazing. It looks, at varying times, like Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Fargo, The Cell, 12 Monkeys and Elizabeth. It’s got, in Hugh Jackman and Rachel Weisz, two of the most vibrant and emotional performances of the year (two of my favorites, by the way). But it’s also got a bald guy living in a drop of water alongside a ghost and a dying tree, the latter of which he’s eating an inch at a time. They float through space, wordlessly, on their way to an exploding star. I’ve read reviews that call this setting the 26^th century, but there’s no indication of that in the film.

Hugh Jackman is Tom, a surgeon and scientist performing experiments on an elderly monkey. The monkey has a tumor, and while the experiments aren’t making the tumor go away, the monkey appears to be getting younger, which is good but not the result Tom was after. You see, Tom’s wife, Izzi (Rachel Weisz) is dying of a similar tumor, and he was hoping a tiny tree sample would be the answer. That it’s an amazing answer to a different question has little bearing on Sam; he just wants his wife to be healthy again. (By the way, Izzi is only sick in a charming movie way, where she goes outside in the snow without her shoes, is still game for wild bathtub sex, and is lit better than The View.)

Periodically, we leave the modern-day story of Tom and Izzi to check in with Tomas and Queen Isabella. Tomas has been ordered by the queen to retrieve the Tree of Life. When he does, they’ll be joined eternally. Throughout his journey, Tomas has to battle Mayans, the Spanish Inquisition, and booby-trapped temples. These scenes have less structure than the contemporary ones, and leave less of an impression. We don’t find out much more about Tomas than he was picked by the queen to find the Tree of Life, and absolutely nothing more about the queen other than she picked Tomas to find the Tree of Life.

And we also leave these scenes behind once in a while to visit someone I’m going to call Bald Tom.

Bald Tom lives in a bubble floating in space. He shares his bubble with a tree and the ghost of Regular Tom’s dead wife. Sometimes he touches the tree. Sometimes he eats a piece of bark. Sometimes he thinks about the other Toms. Sometimes, although everything around Bald Tom is beautiful and no doubt meaningful, he stops The Fountain dead in its tracks.

Bald Tom and his Bubble of Life are that deadly movie combo of Boring and Unintentionally Funny. The present-day story of Tom and Izzi is so touching and desperate, there’s really no need to back it up with any kind of parallel characters. Tomas and Queen Isabel are explained in a way I won’t reveal here, but no explanation, other than whatever conversation you might have on the way home, will shed much light on Bald Tom and his journey through space. Is he metaphor? An astronaut? Tom, living forever?

The Fountain was directed by Darren Aronofsky, who has the guts to make his movies actually about something. So, I applaud him for that. He’s gotten visceral, effective performances from his cast, and the movie looks great. Maybe if I’m able to wade through the DVD in a few months, he can tell me what a third of it meant.

Like The Fountain, Solaris is a movie I liked, didn’t love, can’t recommend. It’s got a challenging director with a distinct voice, and two appealing actors doing some of their best work. Also, yawn. In Solaris, you don’t blink, not because you’re afraid you might miss something, but because you’re afraid you won’t get your eyes back open before the credits.

George Clooney plays Chris Kelvin, a psychiatrist called up to a space station near the planet Solaris. The crew is freaking out, a couple members have died, and it appears as if Solaris is reading the survivors minds. Kelvin is there to calm them down, sort it all out, and get back home safely. A problem: when he wakes up on the space station, his dead wife is there with him.

Kelvin’s life with his wife (Natasha McElhone) is played out in stunning flashbacks, nearly silent and doled out to us in random beats. Clooney and McElhone are a great screen couple, with the latter being grossly underemployed in Hollywood (I’d say she’s as talented as she is pretty, but no one is that talented.)

On the ship, however, is a different story. Kelvin has tragedy in his past, and might not be qualified to deal with the deranged crew, especially when he’s seeing ghosts of his own. Nothing makes much sense—to them or us—and by the time Solaris reaches its surprising conclusion, we’ve sat through endless, silent sequences in the hallways of the space station. Solaris is an emotionally rich film—especially for science fiction—and it’s got a couple nice supporting turns from Viola Davis and Jeremy Davies. Steven Sodderbergh is a director who likes to experiment, and Solaris is definitely a change of pace for him. Meaning, you know: Shhh. I’m trying to listen to them not say anything.

Once you’ve seen The Fountain, you’re not likely to be in the mood for more sad-sack movie stars floating through space. So, pick one. Either one. You can watch The Fountain, or Solaris, but please don’t do both, unless you promise not to operate heavy machinery for the next twenty-four hours.

The Fountain: C+
Solaris: C+