SOLARIS was a big disappointment when it opened in the US . . . and it's not hard to see why.

With George Clooney starring and director Steven Soderbergh (Traffic, Ocean's Eleven) at the helm, big things were expected of the sci-fi movie.

And they were very nearly delivered.

But although the film has a lot of promise, it just doesn't work on a number of levels.

For a start, it's hard to decide just what Soderbergh was aiming to produce a sci-fi thriller, a romance, a psychological drama, a journey to redemption?

There are elements of all of them in Solaris but the film defies classification. And while that could be a ground-breaking, good thing, in this case it's not.

It's all very well being enigmatic and posing thought-provoking metaphysical questions, but when even prosaic, practical queries are left unanswered (and the pace is so slow you have plenty of time to form them) it's just plain annoying.

When one of the characters is asked a pertinent question, which might help explain things, he merely replies: "It seemed like a good idea at the time.''

That's not an answer, it's just a lazy was of getting out of having to provide one.

And why, if as producer James Cameron has rightly said: "This movie is not an action film and people need to know that going in" is it set-up as if it is going to be? There's absolutely tons of creepy lighting, blood stains to follow and the feeling something nasty is going to happen at any moment.

A quick precis of the story (it's not structured enough to be a plot) destroys any tension the movie has and it is tense if you don't know what's coming so stop reading now if you are planning to go and see it.

Clooney plays a bereaved psychologist, who is summoned to investigate strange goings-on and deaths on a space station.

When he gets there his dead wife appears in the flesh and . . . well, that's about it really. Oh yes, and there's a fair bit of soul-searching and the promise that some basic questions (like, if his wife was such a neurotic pain in the butt on earth, why is Clooney so full of love for her now? And just what is lurking in feisty crew member Gordon's room) will be answered. They're not.

Ultimately, there's just too many loose ends and without paying attention to the details, the bigger picture is just a blur.

Atmospheric and well-acted as it is, Solaris's quest to be a deep and meaningful movie has just left it floundering out of its depth.

Rating: 6/10