Excellent film about the spirituality of science

Rating: Null/10 (17 July 2015)

Contact, based on Carl Sagan's novel of the same name, encourages us to question what it would truly mean if we found out that we might not be alone in the universe. Oftentimes it's seen as though the only people who would be called to handle such a discovery would be the leading scientists and the politicians. Contact argues that the scope would be much larger than that, because the impact of finding that we did not evolve alone nor were we created alone would affect us on all levels, both rational and spiritual.
And for the most part the film handles these ideas and questions very well. The story is told from the point of view of Eleanor Arroway (Jodie Foster), who is one of the foremost astronomers in the world and who has taken it upon herself to search for signs of extraterrestrial life. And one day she hears a signal in the darkness of space, a signal that cannot have come from any human source. Coded within that signal the human race finds blueprints for a machine.
The film takes great cares to keep the religious aspect of this discovery relevant to the plot. Matthew McConaughey's character Palmer Joss, a renowned Christian philosopher, is central in this undertaking, but personally I find his constant presence somewhat problematic from the point of view of the story because he's often railroaded back into the plot to spout his point of view and opinions. The film needs him to explore its themes, but he is handled somewhat clumsily as a character, thus making his message less effective.
I'm also one of those people that really don't like the ending. And there are people that absolutely love it, but it's one of those endings that divides opinions left and right. I find it to be overly sentimental and to undermine the overall message of hope and discovery the movie has. But then again, some people find the biggest source of hope to be the ending itself and they like how the film gives the choice for them to decide what they want to believe. Bottom line being that you have to see the film and decide what you think about it.
Contact is a fantastic science fiction film. It's got one of the greatest minds of the century behind its story, making it far deeper and thought-provoking than almost any film of its genre. I personally dislike some of Sagan's tenets, but I cannot dismiss the thought he has put into them. And that makes this film more than worthy of being watched and appreciated.