It’s all science fiction this week at Daily Stream, ahead of a Flick Filosopher announcement. And here’s a particular rarity for the genre: it’s not often we can call a science-fiction film beautiful, but that’s a very appropriate word for 2016’s Arrival. Here, Amy Adams’s linguist is a calm, sensitive presence amidst trigger-happy military and worried government agents as she attempts to communicate with the extraterrestrials who have recently arrived on Earth. The visitors and their language are truly alien in a way that few SF movies ever bother trying to attempt, and yet this is a terrific example of the genre that may thrill those who have been turned off it because of the shallow way in which cinema too often uses it. For this is a science-fiction movie that does what SF does best: it asks us to consider what it means to be human. (Read my 2016 review.)
US: stream on Netflix and Paramount+ (via Prime and Apple TV); rent/buy on Prime and Apple TV
UK: stream on Netflix (through September 30th); rent/buy on Prime and Apple TV
See Arrival at Letterboxd for more viewing options.
