MOVIE REVIEW: ‘Arrival’ has amazing shots, lacklustre story
This screen grab shows a scene from 'Arrival' starring Amy Adams. PHOTO| COURTESY
What you need to know:
- I do like a good sci-fi story, but other than the amazing shots, I found this one a bit average.
Starring Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, Forest Whitaker
This review has spoilers from the third paragraph.
Arrival was rated by some as one of the top three best movies of 2016 – to be honest, I just watched it, and I have not compiled a list, but I don’t agree with that rating. Don’t get me wrong, it is an interesting movie, though a bit laggy/slow and navel-gazey in the middle. The plot revolves around Dr Louise Banks, a linguist who is called on by the US government to interpret the language of aliens who have landed on Planet Earth and are hovering above it with their spaceships, but seemingly saying nothing that can be understood.
PIECES FINALLY COME TOGETHER
The movie was also described as a better version of what Interstellar tried to do, so if you liked (or didn’t like) Interstellar, you’ll probably like this one. The story is a little convoluted, but in an enjoyable way, because when the pieces finally come together (in a way that I found a little anticlimactic) it is well worth the wait. It also felt like they were setting up for a sequel – one certainly hopes not. But is it well worth its several Oscar nominations? I don’t know about all that. Mr Whitaker serves as the slightly clueless authoritarian figure who insists on questioning the experts he brought in constantly; Renner’s function is to…I’m not sure what. The rest of the cast is pretty much consciously ignored, though with reason, until we figure out exactly why.
SPOILER ALERT
And why are the aliens here? Spoiler alert: because they want to give humans a gift that will allow us to see time as they see it; in a cyclical manner, such that humans are able to tell the future; which is what Louise Banks realizes she is able to do. The reason think they are setting us up for a sequel is that the aliens mention that they will need our help in 3000 years, which they don’t show in the movie, so I’m waiting to see if they leave it open-ended.
I do like a good sci-fi story, but other than the amazing shots, I found this one a bit average.
