Arrival

The Americans have finally decided to shoot a narrative sci-fi movie that, even though it’s lacking action, can still leave such a mark on the sci-fi genre that you’ll never be able to forget it. It even has innovative ideas and premises that aren’t cliché and they’re not based on a brand, unlike the comics movies industry. Arrival is a filmmaking triumph of the year. Not only does it come up with an interesting thought, it also turns it into a whole array of original ideas. For example, for a whole hour and a half, I thought that I was keeping up, but then in the last half an hour, I was completely lost and I had to keep thinking about the movie for the rest of the evening. That hasn’t happened to me in a long time and I’m always glad when it does. I think Denis Villeneuve is one of the most essential American (Canadian) contemporary filmmakers. Plus, I must thank Jóhann Jóhannson, the master of minimalism, for being extraordinary once again and choosing Max Richter to compliment his non-music. As I was saying, a movie that is genius as far as the idea goes, but also the production’s ration of sound to visuals, thus meeting all the requirements for high-quality science fiction. (07/12/2016)

I would never have believed that a sci-fi film could say more about the nature of people in general than the hundreds of other psychological films that have graced cinema screens. This a cinema event with capital E, I've been waiting for sci-fi like this since Zemeckis's excellent Contact in 1997. And at the same time it's a litmus test of our population, whether you're idiots (like the guys two rows behind me, who spent the whole movie making jokes and unknowingly poking fun at their own idiocy) or sensitive people who can appreciate something like this. And Amy Adams is awesome. (21/11/2016)

The perfection of form, where every flyover, orbit, or simply a view of the elegance of anything is a visual fairy tale, won me over after a few minutes. I realized that Amy Adams is playing the role of her life right from the prologue. But I still remained sober, I still anxiously waited to see exactly how those touching family scenes would connect with the archetypal sci-fi plot, and until the very last moment, I didn't believe that they wouldn't appear as randomly thrown together elements. They didn't. Instead, Denis Villeneuve proves that he can cross genres in a Christopher Nolan-esque way, escalate tension, and share with us exhaustive spectator experiences that leave me so exhausted that I can't believe Arrival is really just a movie. Personal. (16/11/2016)

Lethal Contact. In the past, many giants of the silver screen have tried to convey space, time, size, relativity or being that go beyond the perception through the movie: from Kubrick, Mallick or Zemeckis to Nolan. Sometimes more or less successfully and sometimes absolutely ridiculously. Villeneuve is one of them. Also more or less successfully. The movie tries to use a smart and refined construction (to the extent that it is more interesting in what topics it describes than in the story it tells), a tangible subliminal tension and, above all, an intimate melancholic personal line that would like to raise emotions. And this is exactly the problem to some extent, because in the end it is cold and depersonalized, despite all the efforts. Although stylistically cool and depersonalized, but with regard to what emotions it is trying to raise, there is a noticeable contradiction in that. And even if it's about something completely different, what is a big letdown is that the linguistic line faded away extremely fast. Especially when the original went much further in this respect (Fermat's principle, etc.). SPOILER-like PS: I'm quite surprised that the movie doesn't follow the tradition of Czech and foreign movies and doesn’t immediately reveal the plot by using rather dramatic title à la "Memories of the future" or something similar. (10/11/2016)

I can argue that the screenplay is very stumbling, but I can't deny that one of the best living directors totally mesmerized me. The first third has a tension that takes your breath away (the thoughtfulness of the shots and their composition is far above anything you can see in Hollywood today). The remaining two-thirds can't help but hint at clumsiness and banality, but Young's darkened visuals and ingenious sound design accentuate the supporting emotions of Chiang's masterpiece. It is not a film about a close encounter with creatures from the stars, but about a close encounter with ourselves. With our phobias and mortality. And especially a film about the greatest curse of all - the linear perception of time. The plot sometimes includes phrasing twists and dull side characters, but this deep undertone, which the enchanting Nolan wanted so much in Interstellar, killed me - also because Amy Adams's performance is absolutely disarming. The canary, who accompanies scientific landings in the film as a sensitive sensor, is a good metaphor for Arrival. This film works with such subtle nuances that one can actually overlook them. They are hidden under strong vibrations, but even if they are weak, in the end they exceed everything. The level of expectations towards Blade Runner is reaching maximum. The best sci-fi of the year. (09/11/2016)