Aesthetically daring, ‘Arrival’ also echoes popular sci-fi films

“Arrival” is either a mainstream movie masquerading as an art film or an art film pretending to be commercial product. Either way, it works.

Its mainstream appeal lies in its dramatic setting. A dozen giant ovals, presumably from outer space, suddenly appear around the world, hovering. Diplomatic missions race against time to find out who these aliens are and what they want before the various national militaries decide to take matters into their own hands.

The general audience’s natural curiosity is rewarded because contact is indeed made with the alien creatures, a handful of humans get to enter the mysterious ovals, and yes, it’s treated to actual glimpses of these unknown lifeforms. And when China and Russia and a few others eventually lose patience and decide to attack, global warfare is at hand.

This imminent war-of-the-worlds scenario is given a refreshingly cerebral turn, however, by having its hero (or heroine) be a linguist, Dr. Louise Banks (played by Amy Adams.) Her job is to try to communicate with the visitors. Since she believes that language is the basis of all civilization she is trying to understand no less than the very foundational basis of an entire alien race.

Encased in full spacesuit garb and given a series of short windows of time to interact, she undertakes a painstaking trial and error method of engagement. She experiments with oral and written and visual forms of communication.

When it eventually becomes clear the aliens are indeed attempting to communicate something, it becomes equally clear that their communication is not at all linear. But then what is it? So absorbed by her work is she, a scientist colleague of hers even asks her if she is dreaming in “alien.” Her dreams seem to focus more and more on memory flashes of her now deceased daughter but beyond that, she’s not sure what to make of them either.

Clearly a thinking man’s (and woman’s) sci-fi film, “Arrival” is also aesthetically daring, sometimes reminiscent of the deliberate pacing and visual sumptuousness of “2001: A Space Odyssey.” Echoes of other sci-fi films also crop up, like “The Day the Earth Stood Still,” Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” and maybe even “Interstellar” and “Melancholia.”

At times the film takes disappointing short cuts – her alien translations advance in sudden leaps and bounds – and the dialogue can get a little cornball. But to its credit, the movie doesn’t spoon-feed us answers.

It’s a film that requires and rewards post-viewing thought. In fact, I found that the more I thought about “Arrival” the more I liked it. And that’s a good sign in any language.