Denis Villeneuve is one of the very few contemporary directors who can do literally no wrong. Every single film that he has created has been a unique, profound piece of cinema that you remember forever despite the subject matter being your favorite or not. It’s his mastery of how to pace mysteries that make his films such masterful creations.
This was the first time that Villeneuve collaborated with Bradford Young for the cinematography, and a mesmerizingly haunting soundtrack by Johann Johannsson makes the film a terrifying, mysterious, and perspective-changing film.
How to Stream or Download Arrival (2016) Full Movie Online
To stream or to download the movie, click on the Download button located below this review. If you like performances by Amy Adams, check her out in Batman: Dawn of Justice or in Zack Snyder’s Justice League where she plays Lois Lane, Superman’s love interest. Jeremy Renner’s fans can enjoy watching him in other superhero movies, such as Avengers: Endgame, where he plays Hawkeye. Forest Whitaker is also a superhero films actor – check him out in Black Panther as Zuri.
The Movie Review
Following Louise Banks (Amy Adams) a linguist, her daughter Hannah dies at the age of 12 from a disease that was incurable. The story starts when 12 extra-terrestrial spacecraft as they hover over different countries in the world. Louise is called to try and communicate with them while being provided help from physicist Ian Donnelly (Jeremy Renner).
They both must work together to decode the complex written font of the alien species that has arrived, the language contains of different sorts of symbols and lined figures.
After a ton of different things happening both in real-time and subliminally, Banks begins to grasp the understanding of what she should be doing and what she wants to do. She eventually gives in to her desires and tries to make contact on her own, sending her down into a rabbit hole of time breaking continuity blanks in space which can only be done through communication. To explain it further, the main protagonist, Louise Banks being a linguist isn’t just for the furthering of the film’s plot. It’s to push the fact that communication can be the best means to any positive outcome.
This idea is scattered throughout the film, even one of its largest moments has the same idea to put forward. Louise’s understanding of the alien language gives her the ability to perceive the future, past and present in a different light. This ideology forces upon us the concept that communication can be helpful in creating not just allies, but pathways to other things such as love, aspirations and even dreams, and of course, community.
Jeremy Renner’s character is a character that is supposedly her guardian angel; he stays there by her side as she fights her battles and understands what she wants to do. He helps her figure everything out and eventually becomes a part of her life. When Louise gains the ability to understand the future and the past, she tells Donnelly about their future and that how it will affect them, ending the film on a note of understanding and doing things that you want to despite them not turning out perfectly okay by the end.
Amy Adams and Jeremy Renner convey the characters’ convictions with such grace and dignity that you cannot help but feel their struggle throughout the film. Louise’s depression is straightforward and visible throughout the film on Amy’s face, even when she’s smiling or laughing you can see it there, clearly. Donnelly’s whole personality revolves around Louise and the mystery of the aliens, and yet Renner’s performance captures the hidden sorrow behind his character’s motivations so well.
This film could not have been the way it was if it wasn’t for the incredibly well-paced direction of Denis Villeneuve. The film screams atmosphere, it’s filled with a color palette drenched in dark blues, greys, greens, and browns.
Yet occasionally the film ditches its conventional look and goes for more saturated yellows, and oranges. Each color in the film signifies a different human emotion, cinematographer Bradford Young has done his finest cinematography job yet. Johann Johannsson’s haunting soundtrack is another aspect that brings an ambiance to this atmosphere and elevates the experience even further. It conveys each moment of fear, each revelation, and each emotion with a graceful beauty that is rare to do so with music.
So, to conclude this review; Denis Villeneuve’s consistency in his filmmaking has been evident throughout the entirety of his career. Everything that he creates has its own vibe, its own originality and its very own style. Arrival is the culmination of everything he had done before this, and entering the world of science fiction, he gives us a glimpse into a future where every single problem that we can solve through understanding, and learning the ways to communicate our stories.
