Contact (film)

Ellie Arroway, having lost her parents early, devoted her whole life to science. Ellie becomes a member of the SETI project , listening to the radio band in search of signals from extraterrestrial civilizations at the Arecibo Observatory . All attempts are futile, and the future of her project is in jeopardy: officials completely devoid of any imagination and curiosity insist that she do something more practical, and refuse to finance it. Ellie is desperate to find support, but unexpectedly receives help from the eccentric millionaire S. R. Hadden ^{[approx. 1]} .

Long-term searches yield results - Ellie picks up the long-awaited signal from space. A sequence of numbers, which is undoubtedly of artificial origin ( prime numbers ), comes presumably from the star Vega . The decoding of the signal, with which S. R. Hadden again helped, shows that the signal, among other things, contains a description of the technical device. Its purpose is not clear, but a place for one person is conceived inside.

The world community decides to manufacture a device worth $ 300 billion and test it. The first attempt is unsuccessful - the tester and the device itself perishes at the hands of the leader of a religious terrorist group. But it turns out that in conditions of secrecy, a second installation was built in parallel on Hokkaido Island, and Ellie becomes the second tester.

After starting the device, Ellie goes on a journey through the system of wormholes and is probably transferred to the planet in a different star system. Waking up there on the seashore, she meets a representative of another civilization, who chose the image of her late father. Glancing around, the heroine realizes that this area is recreated by an alien mind in her mind in the image of a drawing drawn by her in childhood. The alien tells her that the device allows you to organize a system of interstellar communications and the Earth will now become a member of the Community of Civilizations of the Universe.

Ellie comes back and comes to life on Earth. From the point of view of outsiders, nothing happened to her after the installation started and her body did not leave the Earth. Ellie is in a paradoxical situation. Being a scientist, from the point of view of strict science, she cannot confirm her words in any way, although she uses the theoretical assumption of the theory of relativity , according to which the time spent outside the Earth would be 18 hours on it.

An investigation by the Senate Committee on the effects of the tests leads to unexpected results. It is suspected that Hadden forged an extraterrestrial signal and misled the entire world community. You can’t ask him anymore - the millionaire passed away. Ellie, presumably, is, voluntarily or involuntarily, an accomplice in such an expensive hoax. She finds unexpected support from ordinary people and a loved one, the philosopher and preacher Palmer Jos, who are ready to take her word for it. One more circumstance is also becoming clear: a video camera attached to Ellie during the trip did not record anything, but the duration of the empty recording was not a few seconds, but those same 18 hours.

At the end of the film, against the background of the starry sky, the inscription FOR CARL appears in memory of Karl Sagan , who died in December 1996, while the film was being shot.

One of the main tasks that Zemeckis set for himself was to show how a variety of people will react to the possibility of contact with an alien civilization, whether it be scientists , officials , priests or religious fanatics . Perhaps the main problem that is addressed in the film is the contradictions between the scientific and religious approach to the world, which are embodied in the images of the main character Ellie Arroway and her beloved man Palmer Jos. The culmination of the confrontation between science and religion in the film comes at a time when the commission refuses the main character to pilot a space device, since Ellie is an atheist , and the commission cannot allow an earthly civilization, "in which about 95% of people believe in one or another god " represented by an atheist. In its style and musical accompaniment, it recalls the previous picture of Zemeckis - “Forrest Gump” .

Well-known film critic Roger Ebert in his review noted:

“The film is dedicated to Ellie’s scientific quest, but at the same time it reveals her personality and consciousness. It is amazing to encounter a science fiction picture that touches on the themes of love, death, the existence of God. Of course, science fiction literature has been exploring these issues for many years, but films such as Independence Day predominate in cinema science fiction, the plot of which boils down to how actors resist obsessive special effects. "

Original text

The movie is about Ellie's search, but it is also about her mind and personality. It's surprising to find a science fiction film exploring issues like love, death and the existence of God; science fiction as a literary form has of course explored those subjects for years, but sci-fi movies generally tend toward titles such as `` Independence Day, and are about actors being attacked by gooey special effects.

- Roger Ebert ^[4]

“Contact” was in second place on the list of the most reliable science fiction films according to NASA ^[5] .

• 1998 - Hugo Award
  • best performance .
• 1998 - Saturn Prize
  • best actress and best novice actress.
• 1998 - Oscar nomination
  • The best work of a sound engineer.
• 1998 - Golden Globe Nomination
  • best actress.

• Space Odyssey 2001
• Close contacts of the third degree
• Tarter, Jill

Notes

1. ↑ The plot of the plot is based on the real story of the American astronomer Jill Tarter . The financial support for the SETI project was provided by Jack Welch - General Electric Corporation CEO

Footnotes

• Official movie website
• Benjamin Svetkey. Making "Contact" . Entertainment Weekly (July 18, 1997). Date of treatment May 28, 2015.
• Contact on the Internet Movie Database