Returning to the Scene of The Crime
Returning to the Scene of The Crime
Solaris and the Psychoanalytic Detective
This chapter explores issues of temporal, psychological, and societal traumas as they are rendered bare onscreen in Solaris (2002) and its ‘psychoanalytic detective’. Solaris conceptualises the process of memory details and negotiation of personal histories in not only immersing the spectator in the character's memories, but in allowing the characters to actually interact directly with these recollections, as a result of the planet Solaris' psychological effects on the inhabitants of the orbiting space station. In effect, both the protagonist and the viewer are required to return to the scene of the psychoanalytic crime. Solaris is one of the first Hollywood films to negotiate the larger trauma of 9/11 within a diffused cultural space. As a post-9/11 film, Solaris' story of an individual coming to terms with trauma provides an opening to view the larger issues of a society, particularly as it copes with the open wound of a traumatic event.
Keywords: trauma, Solaris, 9/11, psychoanalytic detective, memory, personal histories, psychological effects, post-9/11 film
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