Arrival (2016) Discussion

aceattorney

aceattorney

TXB Join Date: 02/2002
Sep 11, 2013
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The film is based on the short story, "Story of Your Life," by Ted Chiang.

I just finished reading the short story. Here are some spoilerific thoughts:

Yes, the scenes describing the daughter are all powerfully moving. The science of linguistics and physics were fascinating to learn about. However, the ending seems far too easily explained. I'm sure Chiang intended readers to believe that Louise somehow developed the ability to know her future, and somehow her conscience in the past would also know this, but quite honestly the simplest explanation to me is that Louise simply lost her mind and now confuses memories of her past and present. She believes she is living in the past with full knowledge of the future, but in fact, she is in the present and is insane.

Aside from this, like I said, there are elements of the story that are brilliant, and while I praise Chiang for his attempt at creating a deeper story, I think it falls short.

The movie by the way seems to be filled with action and drama, which the story is completely devoid of.Gotta love Hollywood.
 
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Watched the movie tonight. In some ways, more interesting than the short story. In other ways, not complex enough, in the way the short story is.

Ultimately, the ending of the movie is more convincing to the point of the story, so I have to give the film credit.

Some folks will find the movie slow-paced and the point of the movie hokey.

I recommend reading the story first and then watching the movie.
 
Really want to see this. I have to try and make some time for the cinema.
 
Here's a huge point that I think the movie fails to make that the short story conveys:
Louise comes to understand that she doesn't merely have the ability to see the future - she possesses the ability to live at all moments in her life simultaneously. There's no yesterday, today, or tomorrow. No beginning and no end. Also, if I'm not mistaken, in the short story, she has no clue what the aliens' ultimate purpose was, to the extent that she doesn't even realize that her perception of time was drastically changed as a result of her encounters with the aliens (this was my biggest problem with the short story. One could easily conclude that she simply became insane and only believed that she could perceive her entire life simultaneously).
 
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Just back from seeing this. I throughly enjoyed it. I'll picking up that book to read as well.
 
menace-uk- said:
Really?

I thought it was boring. I thought the ending the was pretty crap too.
Click to expand...

I really liked it. Yeah it was slow but it was a good story. The only bad thing about the end was I saw it coming a mile away and so didn't surprise me in the slightest.
 
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