Study diary

I chose to analyse the excerpt from ‘Solaris’ because its philosophical perspective intrigued me. Also I felt that Tarkovsky’s prestige demands a closer look and in-depth investigation so I can say that it represented a challenge.

Although I only started my research in the second week, I got to rewatch the film and take notes in the first week. I was familiar with the subject but it has been about 5 years since I had seen it. There are many subjects to analyse and the fact that the entire movie provides such complex issues for debate further contributed to my enthusiasm. I started by jotting down the ideas and connections with psychological ans social aspects that the dialogue in the excerpt connoted to. By further connecting those elements to the diversity of messages that the film presents I got to feel closer to understanding Tarkovsky’s intention and see his contribution to the story. The message was transformed for me from the initial psychological field and the sci-fi implications and connections to the thirst for knowledge through to seeing the message of the film as a possible grand-scale metaphor of the experience of death (along with the idea of coming to terms with the human condition and accepting vulnerability) – transgression towards another realm, towards an Unknown that we can only experience at its own time.

I wanted to back-up my ideas but at the same time I was glad to see that, while doing the research other ideas have arised and informed my exploration.

Due to more personal circumstances I wasn’t able to devote as much as I would have wanted to the completion of the blog and ended up with yet unanswered questions, but I will make up for it with further research for the wiki.