If you care to read Ted Chiang‘s “Story Of Your Life,” the 39-page short story that Denis Villenueve‘s Arrival (Paramount, 11.11)is based upon, here it is.
If that sounds too hard, here are excerpts from the Wikipedia synopsis of Chiang’s story, to wit:
“Dr. Louise Banks (Amy Adams) is enlisted by the military to communicate with a race of aliens — called Heptapods — who’ve landed on earth and are looking to learn and communicate.
“The Heptapods’ spoken language is known as Heptapod A (harder to learn than Japanese or Czech) while Heptapod B is their written language, Heptapod B has such complex structure that a single semagram (or determinative) cannot be excluded without changing the entire meaning of a sentence.”
Are you getting a feeling that Arrival is going to be a very cerebral experience — i.e., the anti-Independence Day? Which is good, right? Who wants to watch another bonehead alien-invasion flick? Why then do I wish that Jeff Goldblum was costarring in Arrival instead of Forrest Whitaker, who’s always hulking, panting and slurring his words?