ARRIVAL (2016)

ARRIVAL (2016)
-The best thing we have to do when alliens visit the earth-

Genre                          : Drama, Scince-Fiction

Directed by               : Denis Villeneuve

Words, in this case human language, may not be able to convey how gorgeous and perfectly crafted this movie is. Arrival is a truly remarkable sci-fi which we can put on par with many great or classic sci-fi movies out there.
Recommend much!!!

“If you could see your whole life laid out in front of you,
would you change things?”
— Dr. Louise Banks

In the Hollywood tradition, the most logical thing to do when aliens visit the earth is to bombard them with all the weapons we have. Hmm, we know this is excessive and too aggressive. Come on, our curiosity is greater than that fear. I think the most realistic action when aliens visit the earth is to do what people do in Arrival ; investigate them, find out their background and goals, and try to communicate.

Summarizing it like this might make Arrival seem insignificant for the size of a sci-fi movie, but indeed the plot is only about the scientists who trying to find a way to make contact with extraterrestrial beings. This is a human film which packed in a high-tech sci fi concept.

Are we ready to meet them? Not really. But we can to learn. When 12 giant mortar-shaped alien planes appeared in various places in the hemisphere, we don't know what we are facing. The plane that called this "shell" only floated, not cause any impact. Are they friendly? or dangerous even? We don't know. To try doing a kind of dialogue with one of the space entities that landed in Montana, the American Government through Colonel Weber (Forest Whitaker) recruited Louise Banks (Amy Adams), a language professor who seemed just having experience the hardest phase in her life, as seen from the flash of her daughter who died because the malignant cancer. She was assigned with a physicist, Ian Donnelly (Jeremy Renner). They were sent to teach the heptapod "This is Louise" and "This is Louise's book". This is done to successfully find out the answer to the question, "what is your purpose on Earth?" What is the true intention of arrival the alliens which named heptapods (hepta = seven) (pods = feet).

Language and communication are the core of Arrival. In the beginning, America cooporate with Russia, China and other countries to investigate these foreign guests. The situation became worse when they decided to stop communicate. China thinks these aliens are invaders. The public who had not enough information, began to fret. We are also struggling with same miscommunication . We afraid with something that we don't know exactly what. Louise must against the time before the chaos of masses becomes out of control.

As addition of knowledge, in Hollywood, every job are left to the experts. To make health-themed films, they have their own doctor consultant. For films with military stories, they also have military experts. Likewise, with Arrival which taking a linguist as the main character, Hollywood has a consultant for it. Jessica Coon, a linguist and lecturer at McGill University, became an important part of making proces this film.

Coon, who focused her studies on Mayan languages ​​in Mexico and Canada, considering that the language which used in Arrival was actually not as complex as which used on E.T., Avatar, Star Trek, Lord of the Rings trilogy or any language in Game of Thrones. Coon only uses about 100 symbols in shooting for this film.

Arrival is smart in tricking. There is a hypothesis that if we immerse our minds in a foreign language, our way of thinking will change, following the structure of the foreign language. Nonlinear orthography, a way of writing where the message is written as a circle, there is no starting and ending point or intention begins where it ends. This is what heptapod uses to communicate, the real entity is not limited in time dimension. So whether by immersing themselves in this language, Louise and Ian can think like a heptapod? This is one example of making a script written by Eric Heisserer from Ted Chiang's "Story of Your Live" book which arousing the mind.

This is a new experience that Hollywood wants to put the field of unpopular studies such as lingusitic as the theme of the film. However, this movie was more impressive even makes people interested in learning new languages ​​and linguistics. Because in the concept of Heptapods language, nothing relation between the concepts of oral and written. This is why this movie you have to watch if you want to know about linguistic concepts.