Yep, just another study of how Hollywood writers, directors, and producers can futz up a perfectly good notion. Zane Zaminski (cool first name, geeky last name) sports horn-rimmed glasses (geek!) and a goatee (cool!), has a muscle-bound physique (cool!), and is a radio astronomer looking for alien signals (geek!). He's tough, however (cool!), but paranoid (geek!).
That's the fundamental flaw in _Arrival_. It tries so hard to present scientific research as something hip, trendy, cool, with-it--when real researchers don't care about image. Conversely, the film also suggests scientific research is for the delusional and deludes the public. It also falls prey to the current Hollywood fashion of a seemingly weak, shallow male lead character supported by a wise, insightful, somewhat superior woman.
The plot comes off as a James Bond piece--minus 007--but with ET as the villain! Aliens bent on world domination. Silly ways of killing off nosy people who discover the aliens' plan (scorpions? Bathtubs?).
The writers also wove in some silly subplot whereby NASA is deliberately making missions fail. The _Galileo_ probe's antenna mishap is cited, as is the initial problem with the Hubble Space Telescope. NASA solved these problems several years before this movie was even filmed. At least the writers had the sense not to cite the _Challenger_ catastrophe.
I'm getting tired of Hollywood hacks who can't--or more likely WON'T--get it right when it comes to portraying science and ol' NASA. It's as if there's an 'us' (your average consumer) vs. 'them' (the over-educated geekheads who need to get REAL lives). I'm not a scientist, but I find Hollywood's running theme on this subject a continuing insult to my intelligence.
Throw in silly background music, a seriously annoying kid, and some impossible occurrences (a nice alpine meadow at the North Pole), and you'll smell that turkey cooking. Watch this film if you need to complain about something!
That's the fundamental flaw in _Arrival_. It tries so hard to present scientific research as something hip, trendy, cool, with-it--when real researchers don't care about image. Conversely, the film also suggests scientific research is for the delusional and deludes the public. It also falls prey to the current Hollywood fashion of a seemingly weak, shallow male lead character supported by a wise, insightful, somewhat superior woman.
The plot comes off as a James Bond piece--minus 007--but with ET as the villain! Aliens bent on world domination. Silly ways of killing off nosy people who discover the aliens' plan (scorpions? Bathtubs?).
The writers also wove in some silly subplot whereby NASA is deliberately making missions fail. The _Galileo_ probe's antenna mishap is cited, as is the initial problem with the Hubble Space Telescope. NASA solved these problems several years before this movie was even filmed. At least the writers had the sense not to cite the _Challenger_ catastrophe.
I'm getting tired of Hollywood hacks who can't--or more likely WON'T--get it right when it comes to portraying science and ol' NASA. It's as if there's an 'us' (your average consumer) vs. 'them' (the over-educated geekheads who need to get REAL lives). I'm not a scientist, but I find Hollywood's running theme on this subject a continuing insult to my intelligence.
Throw in silly background music, a seriously annoying kid, and some impossible occurrences (a nice alpine meadow at the North Pole), and you'll smell that turkey cooking. Watch this film if you need to complain about something!