Review of Arrival (2016) by Tom H — 05 Mar 2017

The most disappointing movie for me so far in 2017. Just my opinion, of course, but you have a theoretical physicist as part of your team and you relegate him to the role of nursemaid? And during arguably the most important intercultural event of humanity's history, the US has assembled among our "team" experts a loose cannon who breaks rules and protocols as she sees fit, to hell with the consequences for the rest of the planet? And why would a vastly superior race that doesn't conceive of time linearly like us not anticipate humanity's characteristic sanguinary responses, including the murder of one of their own? There were only a few scenes in the movie I found appealing--interesting morphology of aliens, captivating alien ecosystem, some provocative modeling of their craft and communication system--but otherwise, I was on the verge of nodding off. Oh, and, typical for Hollywood, we humans are portrayed as some kind of galactic heroes capable of just about anything so that in three millennia we'll have advanced to such an extent we'll be able to help this alien species that's turned to us out of all the other species likely in the galaxy.

I realize my opinion of the movie isn't common, but I'm glad I only paid $1.61 for this via Redbox. If it had been "free" via Netflix, I'd have stopped watching halfway through.