h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Has anyone seen the new and the old versions of Solaris? How did you think the new one matched up? I was surprised at how good it was actually.

I've only seen the new one, but I didn't think it was that good. The only actually likeable character was Snow, who redeemed it somewhat. He behaved exactly as I'd imagine someone in his position would, and seemed the smartest person on the mission besides.

I thought that the new Solaris was crushingly dull. I haven't seen the original, so I can't compare the two. Soderbergh's technique of splicing together dialogue from one scene whilst showing you something else worked brilliantly in The Limey, but in Solaris, I was just bored.

It doesn't help that people have come to expect sci-fi films to be action-led, and this definitely is not that.

It's probably best not to think of it as a sci-fi film, that way you're not disappointed. DG - you probably wouldn't enjoy the original either then - same amount of action, twice as long. It is better though, maybe taking it slower is necessary.

How does it (the old and the new) compare to "2001"? The original was often called "The Russian 2001", which I think is a poor comparison because 2001 really was incredibly tedious (except for the trippy colours near the end).

I'm glad I've found someone who shares my opinion of that film. I consider 2001 a candidate for the worst film ever made. Not only was it tedious in the extreme, most of it made absolutely no sense and what did was a cheap take on Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.

I wouldn't say that 2001 was a candidate for worst film - there are far too many bad films for it to have any hope of that. It might easily be Kubrick's worst film though. What's the connection with Frankenstein?

"Man creates a machine [in this case HAL], which goes out of control and destroys its creator." I'm told that it was the basic plot of about 80% of science-fiction writing in the 30s and 40s, but Asimov was supposed to have knocked it on the head with his 3 Laws of Robotics.

I haven't read Frankenstein but I thought the point of it was that he only becomes a monster because of the way he's treated - or that sort of thing - which is quite different from HAL?

*sigh* Details, details...