Arrival

RATING: B

Some movies are more difficult to describe than others. Arrival is arguably the epitome of that. For one, it's already an extremely cerebral sci-fi drama (possibly even more than Interstellar), and how can you even describe much of it without spoiling the movie anyway?

I mean, on the surface by itself without watching trailers, the synopsis sounds rather cookie-cutter; aliens come to visit Earth in a bunch of weird ships and the people of Earth have to figure out who they are and what they want. Then in the trailers they showed us the creative communication required between the two species--hence why they bring in a linguist to be the main character--which looked more creative and less typical. But none of that could ever prepare us for what else was to come in this movie. Which I can't really say much of.

I guess I could look back at Interstellar, another sci-fi movie which involved some insanely complicated twists that left everyone scratching their heads at the end and wondering what just happened. To be clear, Arrival is quite different from Interstellar in that regard. Different things happen. This particular ending is a bit more ambiguous, leaving what happens after the credits roll a little bit up for interpretation. And unlike Interstellar, where you can more or less understand what happens in the end (even if you don't understand how), you might find yourself struggling to tie everything together in your head about this one.

While I came out more or less liking the film, it gets a little frustrating at times. It sometimes rides the fine line between being ingenious and incomprehensible. While the former manages to ultimately sort of win out, you're still kind of left with a feeling of "...what?!"  But at the same time, you have to give them credit for one of the more original movies we've seen in a while.

Thus, in an odd sense, you can't help but kind of applaud them for what they've managed to come up with. It's the kind of movie that will probably bring people back for a second or third viewing in order to try to figure everything out. And that's part of the trick, really; getting people to *want* come back at all to watch again to try to get their heads straight when you put out a movie this cerebral. Arrival more or less succeeded, then, at its mission.

It's not quite as perfect, though, as some might try and make it out to be. The pacing up to the point were they actually meet the aliens for the first time is *incredibly* slow and drawn out. It's like at times they got obsessed with doing more interesting camera shots than with actually starting the story. But once the story gets moving, it gets moving. The only real other issue is the fact that it is difficult to understand at times, but I suppose that was part of the point; to make people think.

Arrival's certainly not the kind of movie you'll see every day. Or even every year. It's the kind of movie that is likely to both frustrate and amaze. I must certainly admit I'm impressed, to some degree. Could I be even more impressed following a second or third viewing? It's possible. But I'm not necessarily in a rush to do that. And others may not be either. While obviously most people have been amazed, it is worth mentioning that if you're not a fan of "thinking" sci-fi films, you should probably stay far, far away from this movie. Everyone else should give it a go, even if they're not big sci-fi fans--it's more of a drama with sci-fi elements anyway. While some may be more impressed upon first viewing than others, there will be few who straight up dislike it.