Arrival

[areaseven]

Arrival is the latest film by director Denis Villeneuve (Prisoners, Sicario), starring Amy Adams (Brenda in Catch Me If You Can, Mary in The Muppets), Jeremy Renner (Hansel in Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters, Aaron Cross in The Bourne Legacy), and Forest Whitaker (Charles in Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Ker in Battlefield Earth). Based on Story of Your Life by Ted Chiang, it is a sci-fi film about the arrival of an alien ship and mankind's attempt to communicate with it.

The film will make its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival on September 2 before hitting theaters on November 11. If this is as good as Villeneuve's other works, there will be high hopes for his Blade Runner sequel.

Arrival @ IMDb

[areaseven]

[Mr March]

Denis Villeneuve feels like our national treasure and I have no shame in admitting how much of a fan I am, ever since "Polytechnique". His last film, "Sicario", was an absolute masterpiece and I can't even begin to describe how excited I am to see him take on sci-fi. This looks great so far!

[TangledThorns]

Looks well made but feels it borrowed from other sci-fi films the same way District 9 did.

Edit: Not the first time Amy Adams communicates with an alien

Edited August 17, 2016 by TangledThorns

[Thom]

^ LOL!!

[spanner]

looks alright I guess..

[Negotiator]

can't wait for this movie.

and thumbs up for hope man!

[Knight26]

I will be there for sure, looks like a truly interesting and intelligent sci-fi film. Love this new wave of smart, fall sci-fi.

[Negotiator]

[Tking22]

I'll probably give this a shot, but I hated the original short story this is based on, terribly predictable ending.

[derex3592]

I'll check it out for sure

[mikeszekely]

I'm not going to get a sitter for my 1 year-old, but I'm curious enough to check it out when it comes out on video.

And what's up with your acting credits, A7? I feel like you left out the roles a lot of us best know some of these actors...

[renegadeleader1]

So... Aliens master FTL travel and come millions of lightyears across the galaxy to play Pictionary? I hope they're not sore losers.

[Big s]

I saw the trailer and I'm not sure if I'm interested or not. I just hope it's not a tease like contact.

[TangledThorns]

I saw the trailer and I'm not sure if I'm interested or not. I just hope it's not a tease like contact.

The problem with Contact was that while it was well made it missed the message of the book entirely. The book is very boring, just have to warn you on that if you never read it.

Why talk to aliens if you can't even talk to your own mother?

[Thom]

I'm liking the look of this. I think Amy Adams is very good, and the subject of language hardly ever comes up in sci fi stories. It will always be the first lynch-pin.

[Chewie]

So... Aliens master FTL travel and come millions of lightyears across the galaxy to...

GET SHOT AT WITH EARTH WEAPONS.

Me and my buddy were talking about this last night. Almost every "aliens come to earth and we're scared" movie has something like this.

We can barely travel to the moon. We can't get people to mars yet. These aliens covered the vast expanse of space, are HOVERING over several places around the earth and the best we can come up with is a military response?

It's cliche and it's dumb.

Which isn't to say I think this movie will be, because I enjoyed the trailer. Just a nitpick for this type of movie in general.

[Thom]

I guess the first question is, especially when you can't communicate yet, is who is going to be the wolf..?

Keeping in mind, we have plenty of instances in our history where it is never good to be the primitive. We also don't know what the aliens are doing, other than just hanging there. They're all around the planet and we can't talk to them. It's llke a stranger standing silently at your front door, and not you or the police or military can do anything about him. At some point, you're going to punch.

Edited August 17, 2016 by Thom

[Shadow]

You'd think an advanced race would be wise enough culturally to know that just dropping in on a primitive species with no attempt at communication would spark a panic of some sort. Even communicating some basic math would be sufficient.

Edited August 18, 2016 by Shadow

[Thom]

Alien is alien. The first mistake would be to assume they would do as we would do.

[areaseven]

I'm not going to get a sitter for my 1 year-old, but I'm curious enough to check it out when it comes out on video.

And what's up with your acting credits, A7? I feel like you left out the roles a lot of us best know some of these actors...

That's because we all know Renner is Hawkeye and Amy Adams is Lois Lane, so why not expand one's knowledge of films by listing some lesser-known roles?

[mikeszekely]

That's because we all know Renner is Hawkeye and Amy Adams is Lois Lane, so why not expand one's knowledge of films by listing some lesser-known roles?

Fair enough, I just think that including that one big role is helpful for people like me that will later go, "Aha! That's where I know him/her from!"

I mean, sure, you say "Jeremy Renner" and I'll immediately think of Hawkeye. But you say "Amy Adams" and I say, "that name rings a bell," watch the trailer, say "Man, does she look familiar," then look her up on IMDB before realizing that she was in Man of Steel, since I sort of blocked that one out.

[Nightbat]

So... Aliens master FTL travel and come millions of lightyears across the galaxy to play Pictionary? I hope they're not sore losers.

Well, I remember those other aliens who came to Devil mountain thinking our hitparades were composed of SID music

when we had This crap filling the charts

[areaseven]

[electric indigo]

•••·····

[areaseven]

"Awesometacular"

"A-"

"93% and 96%"

Rotten Tomatoes Rating: 96% - "Arrival delivers a must-see experience for fans of thinking person's sci-fi that anchors its heady themes with genuinely affecting emotion and a terrific performance from Amy Adams."

Metacritic Score: 82 out of 100

Edited November 12, 2016 by areaseven

[M'Kyuun]

Can't wait to see it...while high spectacle sci-fi can be a lot of fun, slow burners like Ex-Machina and this are excellent when done well. Looking forward to seeing it.

[Mazinger]

Just got back. A good movie, definitely cerebral like Ex-Machina, though less action oriented.

My wife gives it thumbs up too.

There's a mention of one of the ships being about 1500 meters long and some shots inside the ship that would allow for forty-foot tall people to walk through. Obviously I've got Macross on the brain.

[David Hingtgen]

I liked Ex-Machina more. This became much more drama than Sci-Fi in the second half.

[M'Kyuun]

Enjoyed it a lot- true there was drama, but it served the greater story. I liked how practically the situation was portrayed; like most good speculative sci-fi, it leaves you thinking, 'what if...'

[CoryHolmes]

I think my favourite part is that none of the characters seem to hold the Idiot Ball for the sake of the plot. Even the military, so often portrayed as either unthinking warmongers or useless antagonists, had their time to shine. They all acted as they should, given their roles and motivations.

That was such a refreshing breath of fresh air.

[kajnrig]

I haven't seen this movie yet, but this video sure makes me want to now. I was tempted to just spam this video across all the DC movie threads and the GitS thread, but hurray self-control. (Also necropost.)

 

[mickyg]

I only recently caught this and was seriously impressed.  Really great movie all around.

[M'Kyuun]

Agree. Well done all the way around. I wish more movies in this vein were made.