Brain Food

Rating: 8/10 (20 January 2017)

In an age in which movie makers seem to be completely devoid of creativity and new ideas, every once in a while a movie comes along that demonstrates that it is still possible to make them without selling out to tired story lines, remakes, and cheap gimmicks. The best movies are based on books and Arrival is no exception. By attacking basic thought processes about communication, language, and dealing with the unknown, Arrival forces the viewer to visit some of the things we do that are so basic that we've forgotten the details about how they work and how flawed they can be. This is a thinker's movie; one I'll have to watch several times to fully wrap my brain around the details.
While some of the world's responses to the visitors seems a bit over the top, it isn't detrimental since it serves to keep an otherwise deep story line moving along.