SPOILER DISCUSSION

1.While Arrival and Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar seem very distinct from one another at a surface level, the mechanisms by which they approach their ending and their themes are incredibly similar. It’s astounding to think that Arrival was originally planning on going for an Interstellar type ending. Heisserer explains that the heptapods “were leaving sort of the blueprints to an interstellar ship, like an ark of sorts,” but after Interstellar came out with a very similar style of ending, he changed up his ending. ^[1]Chitwood, A., & Adam Chitwood (15905 Articles Published) . (2017, February 13). Arrival: Eric Heisserer on How Interstellar forced an ending change. Collider. … Continue reading

While I think the more epic 2001– style ending works with Interstellar, I think it would have been so awkward in the confines of Arrival, which treats the characters and the story in a far more grounded fashion. Tying the ending back to language is not only what makes the movie distinctive in comparison to its peers, but it’s also the reason the movie works so well thematically and narratively. The whole point is that we all contain within ourselves the possibility to reframe our past/future and experience them to their fullest once we accept them as they are. If this ability was somehow tied to being on a ship, the impact of the movie would be fairly diminished.

2.The end reveal that Louise’s flashbacks have really been flashforwards only works because of the impeccable editing. Every time Louise thinks about Hannah, we never get to hear her talk about the memory. We only get to see her emotions in response. This leads us to assume that her emotions in the present are in response to a past trauma, but in reality it’s more a confusion and sadness at the general moment she’s witnessing. The movie baits us in because our first moment meeting Louise shows her as an apathetic unenthused meanderer of sorts. The call with her mom early on further establishes that Louise’s mood might not be the best. Given that we’ve seen the starting flashforward, it’s obvious why we’d think this emotional fluctuation is due to the death of her daughter, even though the movie has given us no “real” indication this is the case.

In this way, our ability to interpret these the flashforwards/backs progresses much in the same was Louise’s ability to progress the heptapods’ language . We go in with a starting assumption of what these flashes of time based on our previous interpretation of how flashbacks are done in movies. We are inculcated in a “proper” syntax for how these edits can occur. It’s only when we’re told to reframe these moments, much like Louise herself, that everything slowly kicks into place.

Furthermore, the rhythm of the cuts changes as the movie continues. At first, these jumps seem emotionally drive. We think that Louise is processing her grief so these moments are coming back into her headspace (which may be true if we consider from the POV of “future” Louise). In reality, each flash is triggered by a confrontation with the heptapod’s/studying their language. We see something related to them, and then the next scene cuts to a flashforward.

As Louise’s skill with the language increases, these flashforwards become more specific and tuned. In particular, Villeneuve uses J-Cuts (cuts where the audio from the following scene plays in the preceding scene before the scenes change) to show how moments of time bleed into one another due to Louise’s increased alignment with the non-linear orthography. This all culminates in the final montage which shows a Louise fully in control of her ability to traverse memories. She jumps from time period to time period, having fun with both Ian and Hannah during the moments available to the family. Her consciousness is focused on the moment and not its conclusion. This is also why “On the Nature of Daylight” starts playing again. It serves as a callback to the start of the film, but also demonstrates the way perspective has changed the way we evaluate the song and the feelings it produces.

3.The fight between interlocutors and polemicists is one that is reflected in the communication channels and television screens. The status of the battle can be determined by what’s on screen. Early on, we see only visions of violence on the screen. There’s an utter pandemonium.

This is all because the polemicists, like CIA Agent Halpern (Michael Stuhlbarg), constantly project humanity’s misgivings about itself onto the heptapods and judges them as a result. Every bout of violence described in the movie is one done by humans towards humans. However, in spite of this, the heptapods are constantly judged in reference to this guideline; in other words, humanity’s distrust of itself extends to any other creature who can communicate.

This state of utter paranoia is reflected in the communication screens between the heptapod host countries. Louise tries to send out messages but is shut down by Halpern. Eventually there’s a full communication blackout. Why communicate when you assume that all people are going to is proceed as an enemy? No new ideas can come out from the polemicist. ^[2] Foucault, Michel. “Polemics, Politics and Problematizations.” Interview by P. Rabinow, May 1984, In Essential Works of Foucault Vol. 1. The New Press, 1998. Thus, both the aliens and the “other” humans are excluded from discourse because they’re cast as the ultimate enemy.

It’s only in the end, after Louise stops the war through communication, that all the channels are finally opened up. Finally, the television screens fill the screen with reporters talking about nations opening up, collaborating, and communicating. The visions of violence that plagued the screen and the black nothingness that replaced them have now been opened for channels of dialogue. The polemicists transform into interlocutors allowing a dialogue for “truth” to begin.

4.It’s a small detail, but I love how Costello describes that Abbott is in “death process” as opposed to “dead”. It’s a re-framing of death that treats it as something that’s not a finality. Death becomes a journey that one goes through, but it is not the final destination one reaches because one can always experience “life process” in another “time.”

Experiencing non-linear time in this way is analogous to what philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche called the eternal recurrence, the idea that all events in the world would occur infinitely in never-ending cycles. Nietzsche said that in response to such a view of the world a subject should be willing to live this cycle over and over again. They should embrace amor fati, or a love of destiny/life, and live a life such that they would enjoy it no matter how many times it gets looped through. Louise, by the “end” of the film, embraces such an attitude, enjoying her life over and over again.

5.The relationship between Louise and Ian is set-up and developed in plain sight, but it’s done in a way that’s subtle and not overly showy. For example, when Ian has his first “real” moment with Louise, he tells her he’s glad they’re partnered especially due to their less than accommodating co-workers. The singles of Louise show her with the heptapod space-ship in the background. The singles of Ian do not show the same.

Given that Louise will eventually learn their language, this positioning makes sense. However, when the conversation nears its end, the two are positioned together again , this time the ship is missing. Their relationship only lasts until Louise reveals the knowledge she’s learned from the heptapods. Once that knowledge shows up in both their lives, they’re no longer together. This is visual story-telling done well.

The couple’s relationship is even explored in the voiceovers. There are a total of 3: one at the start of the movie, one in the middle, and one at the end. While the first and last voiceovers are done by Louise, the middle one is done by Ian. Her voiceovers deal with the themes and ideas of the movie, speaking to an emotional sensibility. His voiceover deals with the science and empirical data involving the heptapods. This reflects their initial dispositions, her towards language and him towards science, but also the way they approach what the heptapods bring. She sees meaning and can affirm her life and all he can think of is the data and research that is being done as a result of the creatures.

The placement of these voiceovers is also relevant to the nature of the narrative and its themes. Ian leaves Louise and isn’t part of “her” journey, not in its “present” at least. This is why he doesn’t show up at the “start” or the “end”. He’s not changed like Louise. He doesn’t see them as equal processes that can both be embraced as part of a larger whole.

6.I’ve talked a lot about how great the editing of the movie is, but my favorite sequence happens at the hour mark. After Louise takes off her suit to more directly interact with the heptapods, she experiences more intense visions of the future. Ian and Weber try and comfort her, but she goes off outside to get some alone time. It’s here where she flashes forward again to her daughters death. The scene then cuts to the heptapod’s “frame”, clueing us in to their influence on Louise’s mind.

We cut again to the room we started the sequence in. The lighting is the same as earlier and Ian is present in the room once again. We assume we’re back in the starting location again. Ian asks Louise about whether or not she’s dreaming in the heptapod’s language at which point the camera reveals a heptapod in the room, letting us know this is a dream sequence.

The fact that Ian mentions dreaming in the heptapod’s language makes us think that this nightmare sequence is the consequence of dreaming in this way. However, we know by the end that the real consequence is Louise’s ability to swap between strands of time via her consciousness. In this way, we’re clued into thinking about the effects of non-linear orthography on the brain, but we’re baited into thinking about it in a more obvious fashion. It’s fantastic misdirection.

7.The way Louise reaches out to the heptapod’s frame reminds me of the prologue of Ingmar Bergman’s Persona, wherein a young boy reaches out to a frame upon which the faces of the movie’s actual protagonists, Alma and Elisabet, constantly switch. He reaches out to touch this frame upon which the movie proper “plays”. His touch “starts” the movie. When the movie finally ends, we return to this shot of him touching the screen, reminding us that film in itself is subjective and our interpretations of them are contingent on our own perspectives.

Louise’s attempt at touching the frame is composed in almost the exact same way. She places her hand on a cinematic frame in an attempt to genuinely reach out to the heptapods. Her response is what triggers a breakthrough in communication which is what helps her learn the language; both the starting and ending monologue are based on her perspective post-learning about the heptapod’s language, so this reaching out marks the “start” of her story. It’s only because she can experience her consciousness at all points that she can “start” the story off.

Villeneuve extends this idea of injecting one’s own subjectivity into film by having Louise quite literally get into the “world” behind the frame. She becomes an active participant in the creation of meaning, imbuing it with her own personal touch. No longer behind the frame, she is now a fully-fledged agent.

Just like in Persona, this movement is repeated at the end of the film. This time once again, Louise is in front of her window qua frame. However, this time, she’s no longer willing to stay trapped behind it. She moves forward to knock on the frame to call Ian in, embracing her time with him as a process. She’s now in charge of her frame.