In what ways is this novel about “the limits of human cognition”? What does it suggest, so far, about the possibility of recognizing alien life? Choose one short passage (1–4 sentences) in the novel’s first nine chapters and use it as a basis for exploring these questions.
“We don’t need other worlds. We need mirrors. We don’t know what to do with other worlds. One world is enough, even there we feel stifled. We desire to find our own idealized image; they’re supposed to be globes, civilizations more perfect than ours; in other worlds we expect to find the image of our own primitive past.” [Lem, Stanislaw. Solaris (p. 58). Pro Auctore Wojciech Zemek. Kindle Edition.]
As this passage suggests, the “limits of human cognition” are, paradoxically, human cognition itself. We can only truly grasp and understand that which makes sense to us; generally, that which makes sense to us is only that with which we have at least some kind of analogous basis of comparison. In expanding the limits of what we know, in science, in math, we are never truly searching for an answer, per se. We are searching for affirmation. We want to see that others, on Earth or in another galaxy, have done what we have done or will do what we have done or have done what we hope to do. As Lem points out, our search is for sameness, our cognition’s limit is familiarity, because that is what is comforting; as Solaris shows, discomfort and lack of understanding is what leads to insanity. Humanity’s fascination with the idea of not just extraterrestrial life, but extraterrestrial life that is humanoid in some way, stems from that same vain desire that drives human cognition – we are terrified of and unable to reconcile with the idea of a universe in which we are completely and utterly alone. Kelvin, by the end of this section of the novel, has fallen in love with and is holding tight to this humanoid representation of his long dead wife; he says himself that she isn’t really even necessarily a faithful replica of his wife as she was, for if she were, he might not love her as he does. When he was obsessed with knowing just what this “creature,” Harey, was, he was disgusted and terrified. Once he abandoned the scientific drive for knowledge, he loved her. Why? Because that was what he already knew. He loved his wife in life. And now, as unconventional and unnatural as this Harey 2.0, who makes a point to distinguish that she is NOT the original, he knows that he loves her. This is why he is saner and more content than Snaut or Sartorius; he is not attempting to surpass the bounds of human cognition, as they are attempting to do, because he knows that the “thinking without consciousness” of the ocean is something that we, as humans, could never understand.
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Pick one sequence/scene from Tarkovsky’s Solaris. For our purposes, we can define a sequence as a continuous part of the film that takes place in one setting. Your sequence should be at least 3 minutes and at most 10 minutes long. Rewatch your chosen sequence at least two times. Take careful notes while doing so: what do you notice? What is this sequence doing, in terms of cinematography, editing, mise-en-scène, and sound? (You can find the definitions of these terms on myCourses, under “Handouts” and “Slides.”) Write your blog post about your chosen sequence. You may address any aspect of it you like, but your post must include at least three formal details—things that you noticed while taking notes on the four categories mentioned above. If you need a more specific prompt to get your ideas flowing, then consider how your chosen sequence adapts, responds to, or modifies the relevant passage from Lem’s novel. What similarities, what differences do you notice between the film and the novel (again, only in terms of your chosen sequence)?
(Sequence: 00:33:30 – 00:38:24) This sequence, almost like a “guest” would in the world of Solaris, haunted me. As I rewatched it again and again for analysis, I found myself getting increasingly angry over the artistic choice to include five whole minutes of nearly silent highway footage in a movie about outer-space exploration. The only conclusion I could come to was this: scale. This sequence’s editing features back and forth inter-splicing of close-up shots of Burton (and at times, the unnamed child, who from context we can assume is Fechner’s orphaned son), first person point-of-view shots of looking at the traffic through the windshield of the car, and wide-angle overviews of the crowded highway. I think these play into my idea of this sequence establishing scale. Burton is one man, a man deeply disturbed and tortured by both what he saw on Solaris and the fact that few believe him, in a huge world. Lem, in the source text of this story, wanted to make clear that we as humans are so individualistic that we very rarely can grasp the broad. How are we to suppose that we can understand, let alone communicate with, a being so huge it spans an entire planet, when each and every day we pass thousands, if not millions of our peers, without ever acknowledging the sheer scale of humanity at large? I think this sequence is also one of the most nerve-wracking in the film, largely due to the sound, or lack thereof. Diegetically, we hear only the ambiance of the highway, fairly stock standard sounds of wheels on pavement and the gusts of wind from vehicles passing each other at high speeds. Non-diegetically though, at around the 36-minute mark, the volume slowly builds on some unintelligible background noise, something almost alien. It creates a deeply unsettling mood, and made me feel almost as on-edge as I did while reading the novel. The only way I can think to describe this sound is as a distorted whale song, but in any case, it brings to mind something not human and creates tension. Lastly, the cinematography of this sequence struck me in the way that the film continuously oscillates between being in black and white and being in color. Burton, however, is always in black and white. I think this speaks to an important theme carrying over from the novel: the limits of human cognition. We seek to understand the motivations and machinations of a vast, sentient, plasmic entity, and yet we cannot understand ourselves. I think the black and white serves as a visual indicator of this confusion and unclear-ness; while the background shots of cars and roads are completely intelligible, Burton (and the boy) are more difficult to read. Overall, though this scene was added to the film and does not originate from the source material, I think this sequence more accurately captures the intentions and mood of Lem’s novel than any other part of the film.
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In analyzing Tarkovsky’s film adaptation of Stanislaw Lem’s novel Solaris, my classmate Masato Hirakata chose to write about the same sequence that I did: a 5 minute or so long sequence in which there is no dialogue, nothing really happens, and most of the footage is of cars on a highway. I have admired Masato’s ideas all semester long, and I think this post really highlights his outside-of-the-box thinking. I appreciate how despite choosing the same seemingly meaningless segment of the film, we were both able to imbue through our analysis two very distinct and interesting meanings.
“Sequence 32:17 – 38:23
When I was watching this sequence, I was surprised to see that the highway Henri Burton is driving on is in Japan. At 33:33, you can see the sign above the tunnel that says “Akasaka Tunnel,” both in Japanese and English. The very skyline itself evoked an intense feeling of nostalgia in me, especially at around 34:34, where the camera drives past a stone wall along a river. Russia and Japan are more deeply involved with one another than most people realize, and I feel that their complex relationship is demonstrated here through the highway sequence in a very interesting manner. In the Russian Far East, there is a large number of right hand drive vehicles due to the import of used cars from Japan, which is a left hand traffic country. Territory disputes continue to the present day, and the Japanese victory over the Russian Empire in the Russo-Japanese War threatened the supremacy of the white man, while bolstering Japanese confidence in themselves.
Despite this fraught relationship, movies like Solaris and The Silent Star seem to make it a point to include a Japanese presence. Geographically, Japan was well within the sphere of influence of the Communist and Soclalist powers, chiefly the USSR and the PRC. This is precisely what made Japan so important in the American foreign policy, alongside countries like the Philippines, to safeguard the Far East against a Communist domino effect. For media like Solaris and The Silent Star to include Japan so casually within the narrative acts as a statement, specifically in the context of scientific innovation and space exploration. In the face of grand human progress, political machinations fall by the wayside as socialism paves the way for greatness, no matter Capitalism and the United States’ best efforts.
In the context of the movie, the sequence is critical due to its usage of color. Immediately prior to the sequence, the movie is in color, while the program on the Solaris station is shown in black and white. Burton’s video call is also in black and white, paralleling his younger self in the archived footage giving a report on Fechner’s disappearance and the appearance of a four meter tall construct of Fechner’s son. Now shown in black and white where he had formerly been shown in color, Burton is both physically and figuratively removed from the reality that was the house. Despite technically being in the same time temporally as Kelvin and his parents, Burton is now turning into a memory, losing detail and focus.
The setting itself is also important to note. Burton is calling from the city, and is driving along a highway, which twists and turns along the artificial: the buildings, tunnels, and the highways. Meanwhile, Kelvin and his parents remain in the house, which is a “natural” reality of a lake, grass, trees, and an open sky, and remain shown in color. However, towards the end of the highway sequence, the highway begins to regain color, as the city turns to night, and the city “comes alive.” In direct contrast to this, as the highway sequence ends, it is the house, Kelvin, and his parents that are now shown in black and white. Kelvin is burning his papers from the past, and getting rid of the ties that bind him to his parents’ house, which itself is said to be built to resemble the house of Kelvin’s great grandfather. As Kelvin is set to head to the Solaris Station, an “artificial” reality, the movie shows us the shifting state of memory and reality, as Burton, Kelvin’s parents, and the natural house fades away, as Kelvin’s reality on Solaris and the artificial station becomes the reality.”