With theaters still not operating, for the most part, many of us are looking to streaming services to watch movies, new and not so new. With this category on this blog, I will explore the films I believe are the absolute best of the 21st Century so far.
Director: Denis Villeneuve
Stars: Amy
Adams, Jeremy Renner, Forrest Whitaker, Michael Stuhlbarg
Films about
alien arrival don’t tend to be considered “great” comparatively with other film
genres. Entertaining, perhaps, but not truly great. Quite often we deal with a
plot in which a hostile race of aliens comes to Earth with a nefarious purpose.
“Captive State” with John Goodman and Ashton Sanders is a recent example, and
it is a good film. “Arrival” proves that
in the right hands, films of this genre can reach higher and make the most of
their opportunities. They can be intellectual without being academic. They can
dispense with the combat and still enthrall their audiences.
The opening
monologue is the key. It seems like it’s just a mood setter, but it is vital to
the film’s denouement. Amy Adams’ character opens with, “I used to think this
was the beginning of your story. Memory is a strange thing. It doesn’t work
like I thought it did. We are so bound by time.” At first it comes across as a
bit obtuse or esoteric. But director Denis Villeneuve, I have learned, is an
artisan. There is no such thing as a throwaway line in his films.
Amy Adams
plays Louise Banks, a linguistics professor. She is in the middle of a lecture
the day the aliens arrive. She also happens to be grieving the death of her
teenage daughter.
Twelve ships
arrive simultaneously and position themselves around the globe. Villeneuve
creates tension by positioning these “ships” in areas of conflict, where
tensions are already high. And our first impression is an attack is imminent.
The U.S.
takes a more measured approach toward the arrival than some of the other
nations. They don’t aim their weapons at the ship just yet. The U.S. military
asks Louise if she can work with them to communicate with the aliens to
determine what they want and where they came from. She is teamed with
theoretical physicist Ian Donnelly (Jeremy Renner), who is interested in the
“how” of the aliens’ arrival.
The one ship
in the U.S. arrives in Montana, and the military sets up camp nearby. The
military is in contact with the other 11 countries where vessels have arrived
and exchange information. But what everyone seems to agree upon is that they
have to be able to communicate with the aliens before anything else can be
learned or achieved.
Louise
begins to communicate with the aliens, referred to as heptopods. The aliens
look as though you position your arm vertical to a surface and rest your
fingertips on that surface. Only the heptopods have seven fingers instead of
five.
The
heptopods welcome humans onto their ship. When they communicate, it is behind a
transparent partition that looks like glass. Almost like an octopus, they eject
what looks like ink. The ink then organizes itself into circular symbols that
represent their language. The symbols, each containing different words within
them, differs from languages on Earth that are written linearly. There is no
forward or backward motion, which is a key theme to this entire movie.
As you can
imagine, it takes quite a bit of time to learn the basics of each other’s
language. And there is bound to be miscommunication along the way. As Louise,
Ian and the rest of the other nations work to communicate with the heptopods,
the outside world is gets increasingly anxious at what the arrival could mean.
It is a fundamental human trait to be afraid of what one doesn’t understand. Just
as Louise and Ian seem to make a breakthrough, a phrase from the aliens is
misinterpreted and all international communication breaks down.
This is very
smart and well researched but it doesn’t come across as arcane. There are some
elements similar to other alien contact films. There are those characters here
who believe the aliens have come to conquer rather than communicate and they
prepare for conflict. Perhaps that is an all too familiar human response rooted
in survival instinct. Louise and Ian aren’t those people. They are far more
tempered, inquisitive and bold enough to explore the possibilities.
Time and
circularity are themes critical to understanding why the heptopods have come to
Earth. And even though this film is a few years old, I still don’t want to
reveal too much. We think of time as linear. The heptopods know differently and
show us the circularity of it.
The aliens
seem to know how to remove time’s linear constraints and offer it to humans.
Many may finish watching this and have a few questions, as did I. But after I
ruminated for a while, the questions I had ultimately seemed inconsequential
and overly logical. There is definitely a visceral reaction the director is
trying to coax out of his audience.
Villeneuve
is quickly becoming one of the best directors working today. I hate to think
this is mere coincidence, but the revelation of the film’s purpose comes about
similar to how the heptopods communicate. They eject their ink and it looks
like any other fluid but then organizes itself into the symbols that are their
language. This film at first seems like it, too, is shapeless at first. Yet,
like a sculptor, Villeneuve molds it into the exact form he wants.
That is a
mark of a truly terrific director. They will lead you on a journey if you are
willing to allow them. To be sure, we put our trust in other directors only to
be let down. But there is a reason why Villeneuve is in such high demand. With
this, “Blade Runner 2049,” and “Sicario,” I am looking forward to more of his
work.
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