How does such an object just float? (well... sci-fi)
That's pretty cool (change in gravity)
I feel like the look of the aliens will be critical [ah! they don't do the full reveal]
"Am I fired?" "You're better than the last guy."
Their writing is both beautiful and scary when it first comes out
It becomes less scary when it starts swirling around
Kangaroo
Hehe. "It's not true. But it proves my point"
Well it's true. Without removing things that distinguishes her as a "Louise," why should the aliens think of it as anything but another human. Everybody in hazmat suits.
Yikes. Not a jump scare. But it was unexpectedly loud as opposed to a more gentle alien limb splatted onto the screen.
Um... okay... if your daughter asks "Are the monsters going to kill Daddy?" then even if the answer is yes, then just tell the kid "No."
That's beautiful. "It conveys meaning. It doesn't represent sound." I had a discussion once where the participants considered if it were possible to read thoughts, what that would be like. And while initially I went into the discussion thinking that our thoughts are conducted in a particular language, it was brought to my attention that likely thoughts exist indepedently of a language, but of course we need language to communicate our thoughts with one another. But, if there were such a thing as telepathy, then perhaps communication would be more direct. In other words, if there were a means to more directly communicate the raw thoughts, one wouldn't have to pass through a language. [the part that I missed is the other phrase about efficiency; it means that the heptapods communicate with sound, but then enhance supplement verbal communication with an entirely separate channel of written language; in contrast, human written language is dominantly similar to human verbal language (though I'm guessing linguists might be able to offer all the subtle differences)*]
Hmm. Doesn't make sense... if they were hostile... wouldn't they have already started attacking? Well it is possible that the ships planted have a strategic purpose for an attack... collecting data to check for the ability to inhabit the atmosphere and such. but if so... then why open the doors everyday to attempt communication with outsiders?
Oh interesting. There's a theory for this concept (Sapir-Whorf hypothesis). For me I think it's part of my world view: language affects how we think. While there is a theoretical basic thought that happens in the absence of language, the language(s) one learns encapsulate meaning on the world around us.
Wow. We get a much sharper image of the alien as she hallucinates
Hmm... the problem is that this is their interpretation of what the aliens wrote. ("offer weapon" as a response to a statement they believe corresponds to their question; that is, English question gets sloppily translated to alien question, alien response given and sloppily translated back to English response; but this begs the question, the aliens are seemingly "advance" in terms of space travel and yet they have no means of doing the translation on their side; given that encountering life on other planets is likely a very rare event... for this group to succeed... I don't know... doesn't really add up but we'll see where the movie goes with it)
Ridiculous. So they already identified that they suspect strategically the aliens want to get an ally. And so the thing to do would be to remain in open communications. And yet all the individual groups are disconnecting...
Holy moly. Do the heptapods know about the bomb?
Wha? She can write!?!
Huh. How did they not get hit by the explosion?
I feel as if the heptapods know that Louise didn't cause it
Hmm. Ian says "It can't be random." As he said this and he's zooming in... I'm thinking Louise had just asked them for something. Perhaps the alien was able to spit out its entire knowledge.
She remembers telling her daughter "Non-zero sum game." And earlier Ian mentioned "time" showing up in their message. Going out on a limb. I guess this foreshadows that Louise went back in time? Otherwise... there doesn't seem to be a utility in remembering that moment in that way. Ian already gave the answer. Though even if she didn't go back in time physically... perhaps mentally she did. Putting together the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis and thinking the way the aliens write... it unlocks the ability to think beyond time. And actually, I think that's how the beginning of the movie is narrated... we'll see how this gets executed
Hehe. They're sending her a private elevator
Holy moly. Did she get sent directly inside? Their domain had seemed like an ocean that they swim in... will she be able to breathe?
Oh right. This is the firs time we see more than just their feet
It says "Louise has weapon." Which I take to mean... based on my puzzling thus far... that Louise has the ability to time travel. Either in the way we think of it or perhaps some derivative of time travel
Oh okay. Some plot twists... what we thought was Louise's past was actually a future? When she's talking to her daughter, it becomes clear, or likely, that the scientist daddy of hers is Ian
Okay, but aside from the ability to see the future, the alien said the technology unlocked... I don't remember
Ooo. Nice. I love palindromes. I wonder how many names are palindromes.
She tries to explain it to Colonel Weber. The movie definitely left these bedcrumbs and I was able to follow throughout the movie (see comments above). With that being said, I also have the luxury of pausing to write down my thoughts. It's possible that without pausing I wouldn't be able to process the clues
Huh. Okay. That's a neat little incorporation of time. (private number)
The aliens leave - almost like disappearing and then leaving a vacumm in their wake
Huh. "Based on the story 'Story of Your Life' written by Ted Chiang.
1=20231123
*I have often talked about the theoretical improvements on language, but never entertained the thought that the written language should differ from the spoken language. As a person who typically watches media with subtitles on, I like the redundancy. There is a common case where there is less redundancy and the subtitles offer a different point of view: dubbed animes. English subtitles for an anime are often the subtitles that correspond the the Japanese language. In watching the English dubbed with English subtitles, I will often encounter differences between what is being spoken and what is written. While it wasn't shown, due to the ability to write with the ink, it seems plausible that the heptapods are able to converse both verbally and with "subtitles" at the same time. But instead of the sounds and subtitles ever corresponding, it's just two separate "channels" (as the scene puts it) of communication. In some sense, it can be generalized as a single language split across two functions. Perhaps the closest analogy I can think of with humans is using not just our mouths to make sounds, but also our body to form expressions (body language). Though thinking about Zoom meetings, we don't just communicate with verbal speech and body language, but there's also a chat function which enables written language. Though our written language is the same as our spoken language, I would say we use it quite differently. I'm thinking about times where I find writing an email appropriate, and times where it's much better to hop on a call. But at this point I believe my mind is just rambling.
20240223 Comment:
I was adding screenshots and noticed I gave this film a 4.0 out of 5. However, I liked the overall story and the feeling of the movie several months later is positive enough to feel the need to bump up the rating, especially relative to other movies I've seen and rated recently. I'm going to give it a 4.6 out of 5.
Watched 20231123 (Netflix) (Last day to watch 20231130)
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2543164/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrival_(film)
Date/Time
Thursday, November 23, 2023
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22:35
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