It's Tough To Stick With, But A Powerful Ending Makes The Effort Worthwhile

Rating: 7/10 (3 September 2017)

Perhaps it's strange to review a movie starting with the end, but somehow with "Arrival" this makes sense. Everything, to me, led up to the question that Louise (Amy Adams) asked Ian (Jeremy Renner) as the movie approached its close - basically, "if you could see your whole life laid out before you, would you change anything?" That's a thought provoking question - and put in the context of this movie, it's a powerful question.
As the movie started, we seemed to be offered a series of flashbacks of Louise's life. She was a mother, her baby grew into a young girl. Louise was a good mother, she adored her daughter, but something happened and her husband left her and her daughter got sick and died. What a downer of a way to start a movie. And how did it possibly relate to a story about aliens? Clearly this was not going to be a typical action-packed alien invasion/sci fi movie. But that opening was was what kept me watching. It was clear that the daughter's death had to be central to whatever was going to happen. But how? Louise was a Linguistics professor. One day, apparently after her daughter's death, 12 alien ships ("shells") appeared in various parts of the world. Louise - the linguist - is brought in by the US government to try to figure out a way of communicating with the aliens, to figure out why they're here and where they're from. And she's teamed with Ian - a scientist. And really, until the last 10 minutes of the movie, that's about it. The movie seems to be about trying to communicate with the aliens (and to some extent about the various nations trying to communicate with each other.) I took some Linguistics classes when I was in university. I enjoyed them, but I never would have thought that linguistics would make the basis of a good or entertaining movie - and I was right. To be honest, watching Louise try to talk to the "heptapods" (because the aliens had seven limbs) was tedious and at times excruciating. Why are the aliens here? That was the question for all of the characters in the movie. Why am I watching this movie? That was the question for me through most of it. But the opening scenes with the daughter kept me watching. I had to figure out how those fit in with the story. And - I'll be honest - I still don't entirely understand it.
Somehow the aliens' way of communicating has something to do with time. The aliens don't have a linear view of time. It isn't from the past into the future. It's everything together, all at once. And somehow this has impacted Louise. Her daughter didn't die in the past - her daughter will die in the future. And as it all comes to an end - after Louise has saved the day by convincing the Chinese (who were about to attack the shell that had landed on their territory) to back down (which maybe turned Louise into a bit too much of a hero; I think the point could have been made in a different way) she poses that question to Ian: "if you could see your whole life laid out before you, would you change anything?"
Ian's the father! Or, he's going to be the father! He asks her, "do you want to make a baby?" And suddenly the question is for Louise to answer: "if you could see your whole life laid out before you, would you change anything?" She knows that if she makes this baby with Ian, this baby is going to die as a teenager. Would you change that? Would you not have the baby? Would you not marry Ian? Because the marriage is going to fail. There are things in all our lives that we probably think on the surface we would change if we could. But that question made me think - if I changed the things that weren't so good, that would change all the things that are really great! Everything would be different, because everything is connected to everything else - like the aliens who made clear to Louise that they were just one out of twelve alien ships, all connected. Louise would marry Ian and have the baby. And, having thought about it, I don't think I'd change any of those things in my life that aren't great - because even the not great stuff is connected to the great stuff, and if I didn't have the not great stuff, I probably wouldn't have the great stuff either. If that makes any sense. Very rarely does a movie make you do something as deep as contemplating the very nature of your life. This one did.
Believe me, that last 10 minutes is worth it just for that one question that it raised, and for the explanation of the movie's somewhat strange timeline. It's kind of a tough slog to get get there. It's tedious at times; it's confusing at times. There are things that are simply unbelievable. The aliens seem to have an incredibly complex way of communicating, and Louise really didn't seem to have that much time with them, so her deciphering of their language in that short time was hard to accept. But those opening scenes do keep you watching, and the closing that ties it together makes the whole exercise of watching it worth it. (7/10)