dir. by Denis Veilleneuve
Based on Ted Chiang's short story Story of Your Life, Denis Villeneuve's Arrival follows up his 2015 hit Sicario with a different angle. Whereas Sicario was tense and brutal, Arrival is much more heady and idea-driven, but what the two films do have in common is their excellence - at a time when "hard" science fiction is becoming increasingly rare in multiplexes, a film of this quality is a real treat, and regardless of your taste in drama, there's likely to be something for everyone here. If any film is to herald the beginning of this year's awards season, this is about as great a start as could be hoped for.
Louise Banks (Amy Adams) is a linguistics professor whose class is canceled when a colossal unidentified vessel lands in Montana. Approached by the U.S. military with the hopes of translating an alien language, she eventually comes on board alongside scientist Ian Donnelly (Jeremy Renner) to converse with the aliens - later referred to as "heptapods" - and eventually figure out why they've come to Earth. However, not everyone is on board with the peaceful approach to first contact, and Louise soon finds it difficult to even communicate with other humans, let alone with an extraterrestrial species.
The basic conceit of humans attempting to learn an alien language is fascinating in and of itself, and Arrival spins it into a dual structure of Louise decoding this language while the world around her remain generally hostile to the heptapods, and when she isn't in the spaceship discovering new symbols, she's often convincing military officials to be patient and allow her to continue her work. On a fundamental level, Arrival is a film about communication, and it understands that science fiction often has the potential to reflect the world we currently live in. For instance, when Louise gets to a point where she wants to cooperate and share information with other countries, the United States are hesitant to share intelligence with those they perceive as their "enemies," which raises the question: how are we to understand the language of another species if we can't even talk to each other?
On the alien side of things, the investigation of the heptapods' language is intriguing on two levels. First, it's fascinating for how it reflects the film's most significant ideas. Unlike human languages, the heptapods' written language is entirely separate from their spoken language. The symbology itself takes the form of a blotchy ring of ink, and while ring-shaped science fiction languages aren't exactly uncommon, that circularity does reflect the other fascinating thing about the language, which I won't spoil. The fact that this second aspect would constitute a spoiler reveals the other way in which the language is interesting, and that's as a driving force to the plot. The film progresses through Louise coming to understand the language, and every leap she makes constitutes a major plot revelation. Although the film isn't strictly built around twists, there are a few moments which can definitely be described as "mind-blowing."
In addition, the film contains a puzzle-box element through Louise having periodic visions which at first seem entirely random but which make sense in retrospect. Arrival is a film which begs to be re-watched, as doubtless several elements will fall back into place, and for those who love taking nonlinear narratives and piecing them back together, these visions will be particularly appealing. Although much of the film is based around ideas, it's never dry, and a lot of this comes down to Villeneuve's grounded-yet-poetic direction. There are moments as intense as anything in Sicario, aided by the brilliant score from Jóhann Jóhannsson, but more of it is almost procedural, contrasting ground-level drama with the excitement of discovery. When the film's headiest themes finally reach their conclusion, they underscore these pleasures with a strong emotional punch. Bring tissues.
In the background of the narrative is how the public reacts to the alien landing, and more specifically how that reaction appears to consist primarily of fear and violence. One brief scene features an online political commentator angrily stating his lack of trust in the U.S. government to handle the situation. Another depicts a news story on a long string of lootings around the country, and at one point there's a brief shot of the phrase "Save Our Species" spraypainted onto a wall. This fear also manifests itself in the narrative proper, particularly through some of the military officers who fear the heptapods seek to conquer or destroy them, based largely on how they know humanity would act in the same scenario.
And yet, contrast to Sicario's bleak nihilism, Arrival is ultimately much more idealistic. While China and even elements of the American forces eventually take a hostile approach to the heptapods, it's only Louise's attempts to understand them which actually yield results. Similar to Sicario's Kate Mercer, Louise exists largely as a symbol for compassion and idealism, but the film actually takes her side, and while the character isn't the most distinctive or fleshed out, this is counterbalanced heavily by Amy Adams' excellent performance. The scenes where she's simply trying to communicate with the heptapods are easily the film's most captivating, and the film's ultimate thesis appears to be that communication and cooperation are the key to humanity's survival. It's hard to go into greater detail without answering the question on the film's poster, but that very answer underlines a common understanding as being necessary for humanity's survival.
Arrival continues director Denis Villeneuve's winning streak with an idealistic plea for compassion and understanding, wrapped in a shell of hard sci-fi and filled with heady ideas. Its intelligent script is complemented by Villeneuve's gripping direction, and those ideas, regarding the nature of communication, language, and eventually time itself, combine to form one of the year's smartest movies, and in this time of fear and uncertainty, its themes of cooperation and understanding are very timely. Films this intelligent only come along every so often, and it's even more rare for them to have this level of broad appeal without compromising their potency. Arrival is simply stunning.
10/10
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+ Intelligent script filled with heady ideas.
+ Deeply powerful themes.
+ Utterly gripping direction and storytelling.
- Takes a while to get going, but don't most movies?
- Louise could have been a little more fleshed out.
- Not much else major.
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