I watched "Contact" last night.

[shadowlight]

There were several clips of President Clinton in the movie (press conferences).
He was always so sure and reassuring, he believed in what he said. A pleasure to watch.
Oh, how I miss those days.

[Drum]

1. me too!

here at home and when I was traveling abroad, I was always so proud for those 8 years!
(and Contact is a great movie...food for thought)

[Inland]

2. I hated that movie.(spoiler alert)

Because after all that trouble meeting the aliens, the aliens didn't have anything to say. Why? Because the screenwriters didn't have anything to say. So it ended up some bullshit about her feelings for her father being resolved, hardly worth traveling the galaxy or building a whatsis.

[shadowlight]

3. maybe not for you

but perhaps for her

[stopbush]

4. I didn't like it either. Jody Foster seemed so plastic in that role,

and to believe for a nanosecond that the bad guy could get that close to the space/time ship to destroy it was low-grade-1960s-James-Bond crapola.

Yeah. Not good.

[CrispyQ]

6. Did you read the book?

If you can get past Carl's incredible vocabulary (2-3 words on every page that I didn't know the meaning of!) it was one of the best sci fi books I've read.

The movie completely changed the end, leaving out the very best part!!

I agree, the movie was a disappointment, but that is usually the case with movies based on books.

[Inland]

10. No, I forgot there was a book.

[Geoff R. Casavant]

11. You want a good "first contact" book?

I wholeheartily recommend "The Sparrow."

[peacefreak]

25. That was an amazing book.

As well as the follow up--Children of God.

[Geoff R. Casavant]

34. Still reading

Children of God, only 1/4 the way thru, but so far many of the remaining mysteries of the first book are clearing up.

[CrispyQ]

43. Thank you!

I read that book years ago & couldn't remember the name & have wanted to check it out from the library again. I'll see if they have the sequel, too.

:hi:

[Terran]

12. I like it. A lot.

You must have been getting a snack during the scene when the alien is talking to Jody's character. It doesn't sound like you heard what he had to say to her.

[Inland]

13. No, it sounds like I FORGOT

what he said to her, since it was the sort of pablum that I could get from any Oprah show.

The problem with the movie is, the aliens are set up to bring her across the universe, and she comes back with nothing. No technology, no cures for diseases, no maps of heaven or hell, and NO WAY TO CONTACT THEM AGAIN.

We were gypped.

[Terran]

14. And the Alien told her...

"Small steps...small steps." No magic technology the first time out; I think that was clear, and not unreasonable. What kind of ending would the film have had if she'd brought back some mega-hardware device that proved she went somewhere? It would have been a totally different film at that point, and vastly more shallow.

Uh, "no way to contact them again"? Dude, they still have the transportation device; they just send someone again. The Alien also made that clear that that's what they should do. Geez, did you really watch this movie?

[Inland]

15. Yeah, I watched it.

Didn't the wheely thing get destroyed and left with no further contact?

And what you have the alien saying is even more disappointing than I remember. You have made the mistake of confusing what the movie was building up to (a marvel) with what happened (eh). All the characters were agog with wonder, but it wasn't wonderful. Did we even learn anything about the aliens?

The fact is, there was a huge amount of effort for a first contact and she got nothing out of it. If it were up to me, I would never have built the transporter thingy if the payoff was so low. Heck, I resented going to the movie with that payoff.

It would have been a different movie if she had come back with something, but it would hardly have been more shallow.

[Terran]

17. The first one was destroyed.

Remember, the eccentric industrialist had a second one built secretly off the coast of Japan? That's the one Jody traveled in, and it was not destroyed.

Sorry if I came off kinda snarky; this is a film I just really like. I guess I don't *expect* a great deal to happen as a result of the contact with the aliens, because the film is after all about "first contact"--the ultimate tentative step out into the cosmos. I would hope that if/when this ever happenes in real life that we don't get inundated with friendly alien advanced tech because I don't think it would necessarily be good for humanity.

Anf you don't think Jody's character got anything out of the experience? I would disagree rather profundly on that one. She got the experience. Don't you remember the things she saw? She saw an alien city lit up at night from orbit over some totally unknown planet. That sight alone would been enough for me. I would kill to have the exact same experience she had.

[Catherine Vincent]

23. I enjoyed the movie too!

I may watch it this weekend.

[Inland]

24. Yeah, SHE got something

The entire first contact turned into a personal growth experience for one woman. It had all the weight of a therapy session. Granted, it's a GOOD therapy session. But if I would have wanted my trillion bucks back if I were the rest of the world, and I still think the travel thing was destroyed or for some other reason there were no additional contacts planned.

[Terran]

27. When she "came back", those in power didn't believe her

Most of the evidence indicated she hadn't gone anywhere and they thought she was either lying or hallucinating. And in the congressional hearing that takes place at the end of the film, it does look like maybe no further visits will be done. But it's clear that The People, gathered outside around the DC Mall, DO believe her, want to believe her. In that sense, all those people gathered on the Mall, and by extension the whole world, "got something" too. Moreover, some concrete evidence is noted right at the end--that her video recorder recorded numerous hours of static, even though to the outside world she never appeared to have been gone at all.

So I can see why you might think that no further contacts were planned; but I think it's made plain that there would be some momentum to try again, because of public pressure if nothing else.

As to the fact that the whole experience is a personal one for the main character, well...that's what good fiction is about, quite often. If you wanted a hardware-based space opera like Star Wars, Contact is not your film; but it's very much a story of personal growth set against a science-fictional background. The idea is to be drawn to the character as much as to the drama of the alien contact itself. Such films are rare. "Signs" was similarly good in that way, I thought.

[Taxloss]

30. "Signs" is, IMHO, underrated.

I thought Contact was great. Tellingly, Mrs Taxloss (who intensely dislikes sci-fi) enjoyed both films.

I've lately converted her to the films "Alien" and "Aliens", as well. I think it's because they're similarly character-driven.

[Terran]

39. Good SF is about how people behave in extraordinary circumstances

Both Contact and Signs certainly fit that bill. Aliens too, to some extent. I don't really see Alien that way too much, maybe because you know from the beginning, I think, that everyone except one character is going to die, so character development isn't too vital. I view the critical assessment of that film as a "haunted house in space" as very accurate; and that's not to demean the film at all, I think it's a great film.

A couple of other great character driven SF films:

On the Beach
The Quiet Earth

(maybe it's time for a SF movie thread! in the Lounge of course))

[Inland]

46. Contact didn't try to be a move about personal experiences, though.

I couldn't agree more that great literature and movies can be built around purely personal experiences, but not if the entire plot premise is the effort of meeting another species!

Contact, therefore, began as a movie about first contact, and turned into a movie about A contact, namely, the main character's contact.

I mean, they start the movie in CONGRESSIONAL HEARINGS about the value and dangers of trying to meet aliens, with an entire love interest character about the possibilities of new life, and it turns out that meeting aliens is as informative and transformative as an Oprah show BROADCAST TO ONE PERSON.

Could it have been LESS dramatic, more drained of ideas or imagination than that? What's the point?

Do you think all the characters who believed in her got something, besides believing in her?

As for Signs, if you could get past the earth being taken over by aliens who had no greater power than to run fast and a scary fingernail but hadn't figured out the secret of defending against a baseball bat....

[WillyT]

21. Hmmm... Maybe Ya Should Have Read The Book First...

Then you'd know what the movie was about, LOL!!!

Just kidding.

:silly:

[Taxloss]

28. That sort of information could be horribly, horribly destructive.

"A For Andromeda", a bit of classic (and very dark) British 1960s sci-fi showed how just a mere message could attack Earth. The plot is not dissimilar to the film "Species", but far superior.

The book "The Ophiuchi Hotline" also describes the hazards of signal contact. In it, mankind has been forced off the Earth by implacably hostile beings that originate from gas giants - they are so utterly different from us that they cannot be reasoned with. We are forced to eke out an existence on the other hard planets and moons of the Solar System. Then, suddenly, we start to receive a torrent of information from aliens who ARE similar to us, apparently in the system Ophiuchi. Much of it is untranslatable, but the rest allows us to surge ahead technologically and gives us a chance to beat the destroyers of Earth. Then the Ophiuchians set the deadline for payment ... another very dark book.

Even on Earth, there is clear evidence that technological "quick fixes" cause cultural lassitude - Look at Polynesian and African cultures wiped out by the arrival of Westerners sometimes without the Westerner even doing anything bad. "Small steps" is an eminently sensible approach.

[Geoff R. Casavant]

35. Reposting my remark from above

'Cause I don't know how to post a reply that all contributors to this thread can receive.

The Sparrow -- good book about first contact, showing how even small steps with the best of intentions can have disastrous consequences.

[Taxloss]

37. I've heard it's a very good book.

Have you read "Voyagers" by Ben Bova? Another First Contact book where contact comes in an unorthodox form.

[Geoff R. Casavant]

38. It's officially on my list as of now.

[Taxloss]

41. It's not a GREAT book, but it's a fairly GOOD book.

"Eon" by Greg Bear is far, far better but not about first contact (although it has many of those "unexpected visitor" themes) - although his equally brilliant book "The Forge of God" is. I recommend both of those heartily.

"Voyagers" is a great decription of an unorthodox - but inherently understandable - form of contact, but you have to wait for the final pages to understand it. And it's full of sharp criticism and satire about the religious right.

"Slow Lightning" by Jack McDevitt is a wonderful "contact" book as well - the contact is again unexpectd, unorthodox, and has unintended results.

[Terran]

40. Who's the author?

I need something new to read! :)

[Geoff R. Casavant]

45. Mary Doria Russell

[Inland]

47. And all that sounds like a very interesting discussion

that the aliens DIDN'T have with us earthlings.

In fact, if the point of the aliens was that contact was harmful, why bother? Because then one wouldn't have the movie.

Fact is, the aliens let the earth build a whirly thingy at a trillion bux, which either lead to a breaktrough in technology (big steps) or it would lead merely to the message that we weren't going to get a payoff (thanks, assholes).

In fact, I think it would have been a more interesting movie if it ended with Jodie Foster cursing out the craphead aliens that put her face on a trillion dollar waste and disavowing all future alien contacts.

[Taxloss]

52. Just knowing that there are other intelligences is enough to utterly

revolutionise human society. You think humanity would say "oh, well, we didn't get the cure for cancer, let's just ignore the aliens"? We wouldn't, there'd be a race into space. Curiosity, it's the defining human trait.

[Inland]

53. And that would be interesting too.

The resulting race into space on the idea that there was life out there would be interesting. But that wasn't what the movie was about, either.

So far, you've had several ideas on much better movies that Contact. Which I hated.

[WillyT]

18. You Could Say The Same Thing About God, But That Was Sort Of The Point...

And yeah... the book was better. But I still loved the movie.

Thanks Carl...

[GoSolar]

31. Yes, indeed.

Thanks, Carl.
We miss you.

[Inland]

48. That I hated His movie?

or a movie about meeting god?

[Tesha]

32. (Double post; deleting one of them)

[Tesha]

33. The problem is that the movie ended halfway through the book's plot.

And it had to throw bones to the preacher in the movie. In the book, the
entire outcome is turned on its head by the second discovery.

Tesha

[CrispyQ]

44. I get chills just thinking about it!! --eom

[Inland]

50. Hm! Now I'm intrigued.

Do you promise that there's something waiting for me in the second half that'll meet my complaints? Because then I might read it.

[CrispyQ]

51. Well, I can't guarantee you'll like it, but, I thought it was exceptional.

I will divulge one book spoiler that I don't think will ruin it for you. Don't read it if you don't want to know. You will have to select the text between the === to highlight the spoiler text to read it.

===
The aliens told the humans (more than one human went on the trip in the book) "As much as you are in awe of us, there is evidence that another speices came before us & we are equally in awe of them." This of course was mind boggling to the humans who were astounded at the technology they were witnessing.
===

I enjoyed the book very much, but in spite of the above, before finishing the book I still thought it was somewhat lacking. But I persevered & in the very last pages of the book, Carl pulls it off. It was BEAUTIFUL!!!

[shraby]

5. I enjoyed it..I watched for entertainment

and that was what it was with a little food for thought tossed in. It's based on the lady who works on the Seti program.

[GreenPartyVoter]

9. I enjoyed it too.

[wli]

7. it kind of struck me as anti-intellectual

I've never seen anything out of Hollywood that wasn't, to be honest. This probably has a lot to do with why the only movies I watch are animated and from Japan.

[OfireitupO]

36. Not anti-intellectual at all- but definitely hollywood

But so what? People watch movies for the drama and personal interactions. Contact had both personal drama and intellectual insights into issues that we face every day, such as the science vs god debate.

[elehhhhna]

8. I want my peace dividend. Remeber that?

[donco6]

16. I like that movie.

I've watched it several times.

[Ilsa]

19. I liked that movie alot and look forward to seeing it again. eom

[shadowknows69]

20. and it was cool

when he jumped in that fighter jet to go fight the alien mothership...oh sorry wrong movie.

[Catherine Vincent]

22. Those were the days!

[Roland99]

26. I like the opening scene: the pullback from earth. Wakes you up.

Makes you realize how insignificant yet how special we are.

Makes you realize that *if* there is a god, he/she/it surely doesn't give two shits about any particular political party or its agenda.

[livetohike]

29. My favorite movie opening scene

It takes your breath away :-).

[Roxy66]

42. Love that movie...especially Matthew. MMMM

[Mr_Spock]

49. Clinton is a GOD compared to Bush

Clinton is like a superhuman next to the dimwit in the WH now. I can't believe how much we've sunk since then - I would never have beleived thatRepublicans were such awful rotten craven people if I hadn't seen the decline with my own eyes (and felt our craven fall within my heart). Republicans really are despicable people - I truly believe this.