Arrival

I like SF and I am partial to movies about professors, so I was quite excited about this movie.  And it had all the ingredients of a good movie.  Amy Adams was really good (partly because her character was well written) as the linguistics professor who was trying to figure out how to communicate with the aliens.  She did a very good job of portraying how someone who has been trained in disciplined thinking approaches a problem.  And Jeremy Renner as the physics professor who is (sort of) helping her is suitably geeky.  (He is really more of a love interest than a helper, and this is a refreshing twist on this mandatory element of any Hollywood movie.)

The aliens are very alien.  The coolest thing about them is their written language, which turns out to do much more than just allow communication.  Some relatively simple and low-key SFX are used to very good effect in depicting the interactions between the scientists and the aliens.  And once Adams’ and Renner’s characters understand how the language works, they are able to understand why the aliens came to Earth.  

     The movie has all the elements of a good story about first contact—bureaucrats who cannot think outside the box, riots by terrified Earthlings, a Colonel who tries to help the scientists, even though his superiors are in a panic.  But….

     Some philosophical issues about time are important to the plot.  These are explored in the movie through a series of flashbacks (and maybe flash-forwards) to this treacly, maudlin backstory about the linguist’s failed marriage and her sick daughter.  It is thoroughly goopy and saccharine even by Hollywood standards.  And there is a lot of it.  Really, a lot.

     Even so, I recommend seeing this movie.  The alien/human interactions are very well done, and the problems of first contact are well envisioned.  And it is worth the price of admission just to see the alien writing.  But be sure to get a large popcorn, so you have something with which to distract yourself during the goopy parts.