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Also Known As: Story of your life |
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| Year of first release: 2016 | |
| Director: Denis Villeneuve (Polytechnique, Enemy) | |
| Actors: Amy Adams (Man of Steel), Jeremy Renner (The Bourne Legacy, The Avengers), Forest Whitaker (Platoon, Phone Booth, Ghost Dog) | |
| Country: USA | |
| Genre: SF, Drama | |
| Conditions of visioning: 11.12.2016, Cinemaxx, English version | |
| Synopsis: Mysterious spacecrafts appear one day in several places across the globe. The professor in linguistic Louise Banks (Adams) and Physicist Ian Donnelly (Renner) are brought together by Colonel Weber (Whitaker) to investigate for the US Army. Her abilities for linguistic and communication help the team to make big steps toward the heptapod aliens. | |
| Review: I wanted to watch this movie absolutely because I like the work of Denis Villeneuve since Polytechnique. On top of it for a story that touches me for the insight in the fascinating world of linguistics. Even if there is an apparent collaboration between the linguist and the scientist, of course the first contact can only be done by an expert in communication and languages. The rythm is given by the different meetings of Dr. Louise Banks with the aliens. And everytime something fascinating comes up. The way the language is built, the art of writing, the misunderstandings, the reconciliations, the collaboration between humans, or not. Typical for the modern foreign affairs of the USA (as the movie is from), China and Russia are seen as the most bellicose on Earth, while a large part of the Earth sees the USA in this role. The movie set me up a few years behind when I had this kind of discussions with a linguist. Several dialogues reminded me a lot dialogues I had then. The movie reaches the same status of fascination. The aliens are finally not human-like! And this is a good cut with regard to many previous movies. After the insect-like alien from Starship troopers, the heptapods without eyes of Arrival. The control of complex gravity fields is not that smooth but looks realistic. The simple micro-gravity is well done. The most impressive special effect for me is the writing form of the aliens. The acting of Amy Adams is amazing. In her eyes we can feel the passion for grammar, the disturbance of remembering hard times, the fragility of human being. Great! The other roles are very secondary and covered properly. I liked to see again Forest Whitaker. The original version includes also some dialogues in Russian and Chinese. And this makes the movie quite authentic, even if I cannot say whether the Chinese nor the Russian was correct. |
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Rating: 8 /10
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More than entertainment, an Art.
Sunday, December 18, 2016
Arrival (2016)
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Seen on the exact same day and time as you but 4 hours later at the Cineplanet of the Costanera Center in Santiago de Chile. Not much to add to your review with which I totally agree, even though I never had the dialog with a linguist.
ReplyDeleteI discovered Denis Villeneuve with Enemy and his brother Martin with Mars & Avril. You can recognize his style in Arrival, in particular the fact that he leads the audience in a wrong direction from the start, but in the end you realize that he just gave hints that our brain then connected together when it shouldn't have. Very clever.
The character played by Amy Adams is indeed central, with the others secondary. The story is very simple and evolves slowly but this is the way to leave us time to know and love the characters. That story is not without reminding me of the one of Arthur C. Clarke's 1953 Childhood's End, and it does feel like an extended version of an episode of the Outer Limits TV-series (simple short and efficient SF story put into images) but of course with the talent of Villeneuve added.
An excellent SF / Anticipation movie for adults, that I would even rate 9/10 because it stands out in the current trend of Action SF flicks for young adults that don't show anything near the same depth.