There is one incredible decade-old sci-fi movie that only keeps getting better with time and now hits even harder than ever.
Considering how some of the greatest filmmakers of all time, like Ridley Scott, Christopher Nolan, and Steven Spielberg, have explored the sci-fi genre, some of the most brilliant movies of all time have been about futuristic worlds, time travel, space exploration, and post-apocalyptic dystopia. It is clearly a hyper-competitive space.
Yet, one 10-year-old movie remains one of the best additions to it and will likely retain its place for a very long time.
What Is Arrival About?
Based on the 1998 novella Story of Your Life by Ted Chiang, Arrival begins like a typical alien sci-fi movie in which 12 mysterious spacecraft land on Earth. As humans struggle to understand the purpose of their arrival, linguist Louise Banks and physicist Ian Donnelly are recruited to study one of the crafts in Montana.
Banks soon learns that the cephalopod-like aliens on the spaceship, who they call “heptapods,” use a written form of communication that involves logograms. The more she learns their language, the more it rewires her brain and changes how she perceives time, and, in turn, her reality.
Through its layered narrative, Arrival explores everything from the nature of time to humanity’s ignorance against the vast, incomprehensible intelligence of the unknown. Although Arrival can initially be a little hard to understand, Dennis Villeneuve weaves a genius non-linear narrative that transforms a cerebral first-contact story into a deeply human meditation on language, grief, determinism, and the burden of knowledge.
Arrival Hits Harder With Age
Arrival is one of the few sci-fi films that get better the more you rewatch them. With every rewatch, you notice a hidden detail or a subtle dialogue that perfectly ties into the film’s overarching message. Amy Adams also delivers one of her best performances and immerses audiences into her growing understanding of the simultaneous unfolding of her past, present, and the future.
The Dennis Villenueve movie is also highly quotable, with profound lessons and reminders about communication and empathy packed throughout its runtime. One of its memorable quotes that perfectly captures the depth of its themes is:
“Language is the foundation of civilization. It is the glue that holds a people together. It is the first weapon drawn in a conflict.”
Even from a visual standpoint, Arrival‘s portrayal of aliens and their language is hauntingly beautiful. This perfectly captures why, despite their ghoulish and almost Lovecraftian appearance, the aliens in the movie are misunderstood.
Typical storytelling is often bound by the confines of humanity’s linear perception of time. A movie begins in the present and soon moves forward in a clear, cause-and-effective progression. Arrival, however, defies these confines and perfectly intertwines its ending with its beginning. As a result, like Amy Adams’ Louise, even a viewer is left wondering:
“If you could see your whole life from start to finish, would you change things?”
Denis Villeneuve Has Become A Master Of Sci-Fi
The Dune books, which were largely considered “unfilmable” for a long time, have now been translated into one of the best sci-fi movie franchises of all time. By achieving this impossible feat, Villenueve proved that a sci-fi story’s adaptability in the live-action medium is only the filmmaker’s vision and willingness to trust audiences.
Villeneuve’s work in other sci-fi movies like Blade Runner 2049and the lesser-known Polytechnique further proves he is one of the most ambitious and talented sci-fi filmmakers of our time. It must be noted, though, that his talent transcends far beyond the sci-fi genre. His work in thrillers, like Prisoners and Enemy, is no less impressive and fans of Arrival should check out his other movies as well.
