Atraveller
Banned
Can I have a link to it?
-
Hey Guest. Check out your NeoGAF Wrapped 2025 results here!
Spoiler thread for Arrival | We have Contact again
- Thread starter shira
- Start date
- Status
One of the key points of the book version was that knowledge of the future is incompatible with free will. In fact, the concept of free will becomes meaningless for creatures that experience their past, present, and future simultaneously.
The worst thing about the movie adaptation was that it abandoned this insight into the nature of the universe. Allowing the Amy Adams character to alter events based on future knowledge may be more conventionally "good story-telling", but it removes any real philosophical insight, and makes her into a bit of a monster for choosing to have a doomed child.
The worst thing about the movie adaptation was that it abandoned this insight into the nature of the universe. Allowing the Amy Adams character to alter events based on future knowledge may be more conventionally "good story-telling", but it removes any real philosophical insight, and makes her into a bit of a monster for choosing to have a doomed child.
Anton Sugar
Member
I get what you're saying. I don't think it is either or though.
Giving her a CHOICE, rather than accepting a "fate", gives a lot more agency and weight to her decision.
I think what you're getting at is more the workings of a non linear understanding of time. Having that understanding doesn't remove free will from human beings.
Anton Sugar
Member
Here you go: http://www.theqandapodcast.com/2016/11/arrival-q.html
It's actually a great listen--he talks about various drafts, versions where Louise sees Abbott in his coffin, a mural depicting the history of the heptapods, etc.
RustyNails
Member
Yeah easily the OST of the year.
I still just cant wrap my mind around "learn new language, travel time" concept. I know its a very rudimentary comment but it does boil down to that.
I still just cant wrap my mind around "learn new language, travel time" concept. I know its a very rudimentary comment but it does boil down to that.
Button
Banned
I thought about this too. It seemed like Louise started writing about the alien language, teaching people. Wouldn't those people learn to see the future too? I think it was the interaction with the aliens that gave Louise the ability, in addition with learning the language.
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
It works better in the story where she spends months and months living and breathing this stuff, and where their description of the language gels a bit better with the "nonchronal" idea. Its my big complaint about this movie, it ends up feeling like magic
Hippopuncher12
Member
Finally saw this yesterday for the first time and absolutely loved it. I did however by about a 3rd of the way through the movie start to think her "memories" were from the future. Didn't really figure out the language had anything to do with it though. Great film though.
It's an old linguistics theory called Sapir-Whorf that's actually real, not invented for the movie/story. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity
Atraveller
Banned
Thanks, I didn't know it was literally a "Q&A" podcast.
She mentions it in the movie too. Ian asks her if she is dreaming in their language and then she explains the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis.
Anton Sugar
Member
I love that dream sequence. The editing and blocking directions are subtly misleading/asynchronous.
Based on her reaction (and the fact that there was a brief flash forward right after), I'm pretty sure it was the moment she interacted with the heptapod "ink" that she gained that ability.
DevilPower
Member
In my opinion maybe it was because Louise became highly proficient in Heptapod B that she was able to remember the future... The other people she taught did not become as highly skilled in the language as she...
Think of it in this way... We all understand, write and speak English but very few of us are able to write poetry or a great novel... Same applies to Heptapod B.
(Minor book spoilers about people learning Heptapod B)
In the book a few of the linguists around the world became as proficient in Heptapod B as Louise so they also started getting glimpses of the future.
Finally saw this tonight.
So I am thinking science dude divorced her because she had the kid knowing that she would die??
Still don't get how nonlinear time works, seemed like her future self was giving her past self all the answers by passing thoughts backwards through time.
Other than that fascinating sci-fi movie, really enjoyed it.
So I am thinking science dude divorced her because she had the kid knowing that she would die??
Still don't get how nonlinear time works, seemed like her future self was giving her past self all the answers by passing thoughts backwards through time.
Other than that fascinating sci-fi movie, really enjoyed it.
Vulcano's assistant
Banned
He didn't know before they had the kid. He divorced her after she told him and would had rather not known. He was angry at her for telling him, but I understand he left primarily because he couldn't cope with seeing them every day.
But in hindsight he would have agreed that he would be angry at her for having the kid in the first place.
Why did he not get the gift of the future language, was she the only one who got it?
Rentahamster
Rodent Whores
I guess he never bothered to learn it fluently.
Do you think learning a language is easy?
Learning any language as far as being able to think in it is hard as fuck, learning a really strange language with a different alphabet is even worse, learning a language that's literally made by aliens.. yeah, get it.
The fact that a trained linguist completely obsessed by it managed to learn it in a few months doesn't mean anybody can.
Thanks for sharing.
Yeah, needed more Avengers.
soundscream
Member
Anyone understood why learning the language gave the user nonlinear timeflow?
Is it that the language forces you to see the future in order to write in that circular pattern?
Don't see why not, he seemed by learning along side her throughout the movie
Is it that the language forces you to see the future in order to write in that circular pattern?
Don't see why not, he seemed by learning along side her throughout the movie
It's the sapir-whorf hypothesis - Your thinking patterns change according to the language you're thinking in.
Alien language, alien effects.
See previous post
Markitron
Is currently staging a hunger strike outside Gearbox HQ while trying to hate them to death
I just watched Arrival and Passengers back to back with a friend. I loved Arrival and thought Passengers was boring and predictable, my friend had the exact opposite opinion.
And I thought I had a terrible taste in movies.
And I thought I had a terrible taste in movies.
Atraveller
Banned
What the fuck?
nah, he does.
Monocle
Member
Sorry there weren't more explosions and sex scenes I guess.
or anything remotely interesting
It's ok if you don't like it but saying a movie with giant spaceships and attempt of communication with an alien race has nothing "remotely" interesting happening is just hyperbole.
The whole movie was a big game of charades.
Come on, I admit I had to slog through the beginning as they made contact with the aliens, but that moment when she realizes the memories are actually visions of the future was amazing. Then linking it to the language was even more mind bending
Glass Rebel
Member
What does this even mean?
FantasticMrFoxdie
Mumber
CorrectI dont think it got much deeper than this for Bishop89:
The key to understanding it is the
potential chinese box office revenue.
This movie is fundamentally about 4D, like, we are living in 3D universe, that is how we perceive things, straight line.
The aliens live in the 4D universe meaning they can move and be where ever whenever.
Watch Carl Sagan explanation on YouTube about flatlanders, who live in a 2D world which is observed by a flatlander that is lifted into the 3D world.
The aliens live in the 4D universe meaning they can move and be where ever whenever.
Watch Carl Sagan explanation on YouTube about flatlanders, who live in a 2D world which is observed by a flatlander that is lifted into the 3D world.
SlipperyFishes
Banned
Finally made time to watch Arrival tonight and it was worth it entirely. So many questions by the end (3000 years?) but a really solid flick.
Battersea Power Station
Member
I finally got around to seeing this. Denis Villeneuve is my favorite recent director and I love sci-fi, so this should've been a home run...
... but I can't help but be disappointed.
Firstly, as a film, it's probably the most simple of his four major ones (Enemy, Prisoners, and Sicario being the others). That's probably not true -- Sicario seems like it's the most direct, at least in plot. But then again, I had more questions about myself and about the characters after watching Sicario than I did after watching Arrival.
"Would I have a child if I knew her life would end in tragedy?" It sounds interesting, and it probably is. I might be a little removed from the subtlety in that question since my wife and I are about to have our third child (fingers crossed) and I wrestle constantly with the question of whether it's morally acceptable to have children at all. I mean, you're creating life where none was before. You're causing a being to suffer, to feel joy, to die -- whether they live to 16 or 106. So I can appreciate that aspect of the film, even if it wasn't novel or particularly insightful to me personally.
As sci-fi... dang. I consider myself pretty big cosmology enthusiast, as far as laymen go, and I can't really get past the premise of 5D beings interacting with our "physics."
It's not like the universe exists and we experience 3 full dimensions and 1 limited dimension: it's that the universe IS a manifestation of these dimensions. A higher-dimensional being would experience a completely different universe and our matter and energy wouldn't even make sense in their world, or vice versa.
Also, pretending a being that exists in all of time simultaneously exists, a la Dr. Manhattan, what does it even mean for that being to "do" something? How could the aliens decide to go somewhere if they have already been there? How can you even have a thought if that thought has already been had? Would the memory of having been about to have that thought mean that you already had the thought before you had it?
And lastly, there's the matter of changing your dimensional existence by changing the language you speak... :/ There's no secret code to unlock here. We are a collection of field vibrations that have formed quarks that have formed atoms that have formed molecules that have formed life. Those field vibrations are vibrations in our 4 dimensions and following the arrow of time. Being alive and "thinking" about something doesn't get to shake you out of your 4-dimensional prison. Neural activity is no more exotic, on a quantum scale, than two rocks smashing into each other in space.
It's a well-made movie. And I still want to see what he does with Blade Runner. But it was my first indication that his "formula," if he has one, is wearing on me. Eh, I probably had my hopes too high.
... but I can't help but be disappointed.
Firstly, as a film, it's probably the most simple of his four major ones (Enemy, Prisoners, and Sicario being the others). That's probably not true -- Sicario seems like it's the most direct, at least in plot. But then again, I had more questions about myself and about the characters after watching Sicario than I did after watching Arrival.
"Would I have a child if I knew her life would end in tragedy?" It sounds interesting, and it probably is. I might be a little removed from the subtlety in that question since my wife and I are about to have our third child (fingers crossed) and I wrestle constantly with the question of whether it's morally acceptable to have children at all. I mean, you're creating life where none was before. You're causing a being to suffer, to feel joy, to die -- whether they live to 16 or 106. So I can appreciate that aspect of the film, even if it wasn't novel or particularly insightful to me personally.
As sci-fi... dang. I consider myself pretty big cosmology enthusiast, as far as laymen go, and I can't really get past the premise of 5D beings interacting with our "physics."
It's not like the universe exists and we experience 3 full dimensions and 1 limited dimension: it's that the universe IS a manifestation of these dimensions. A higher-dimensional being would experience a completely different universe and our matter and energy wouldn't even make sense in their world, or vice versa.
Also, pretending a being that exists in all of time simultaneously exists, a la Dr. Manhattan, what does it even mean for that being to "do" something? How could the aliens decide to go somewhere if they have already been there? How can you even have a thought if that thought has already been had? Would the memory of having been about to have that thought mean that you already had the thought before you had it?
And lastly, there's the matter of changing your dimensional existence by changing the language you speak... :/ There's no secret code to unlock here. We are a collection of field vibrations that have formed quarks that have formed atoms that have formed molecules that have formed life. Those field vibrations are vibrations in our 4 dimensions and following the arrow of time. Being alive and "thinking" about something doesn't get to shake you out of your 4-dimensional prison. Neural activity is no more exotic, on a quantum scale, than two rocks smashing into each other in space.
It's a well-made movie. And I still want to see what he does with Blade Runner. But it was my first indication that his "formula," if he has one, is wearing on me. Eh, I probably had my hopes too high.
Living the Dream
Member
I saw this on a plane this past weekend and Arrival now is my second favorite movie of all time; being bested by The Fountain. The score, the imagery, and the story are all top notch. I just bought the Blu-Ray off of Amazon and cannot wait to watch it in an even better form than a plane.
- Status