Watch Solaris (1972), Andrei Tarkovsky’s Haunting Vision of the Future — openculture.com

A friend recently told me about a screening of Andrei Tarkovsky’s Solaris he attended in a state of, er, expanded perception. The vivid sci-fi trip he’d expected turned into the most harrowing emotional experience of his life. 2001: A Space Odyssey has proven a reliable favorite of the consciousness-altering crowd since it came out in 1968, almost to the point where you’d think Kubrick made the film just for them. But Tarkovsky’s 1972 story of a sentient planet and the hallucinations with which it tempts and torments a nearby space station has an entirely different existential conception of mankind’s venture into the unknown realms of space and time. Whatever your own state of mind, you can watch Solaris free online (part one, part two). If you don’t feel sure about taking the plunge, have a look first at the updated trailer above. (You can also watch the original 1972 trailer in both Russian and English.)

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