What was the point?
Why did the aliens want to show Jodie's character they existed?
shareThey wanted to make initial contact.
(Now it's been a long time since I've seen the movie). But I remember that they said that they carefully approach new civilizations and over many years/centuries as they understand that culture, they begin sharing information with them. They assumed that if you gave too much information to a primitive civilization (from their viewpoint), that they could destroy that civilization. (Imagine what would happen if we could give hand grenades to cavemen.)
There was no point, beyond making some E.T.-obsessed, atheist hag (that never read even one UFO book or researched even one UFO sighting) crazy and possibly convert her to a crazy cat woman.
I mean, if THAT is how they contact primitive civilizations, then they might as well not do it whatsoever. Most of the people's lives were not altered, changed, or helped in any way, and most people would forget the whole thing quickly and the ignorant status quo would just remain.
It would be completely pointless - her story would be just ONE among zillions of true stories and crazy hallucinations about meeting otherplanetary people. And the denizens of this planet would react accordingly - not giving it much thought.
For it to have ANY kind of impact the way they claim it would, the CONTACT would have to have been much wider, perhaps world-wide, but at least to a much larger group of people, not just _ONE_, that can easily be labeled as a nutcase.
The way they supposedly went about it is the stupidest way possible, and the most pointless as well. They might as well not have done it.
By the way, if she really was considered crazy (which is pretty insane, all the effort considered), then .. what did people think about all those signals that DID come from Vega, all those blueprints that DID come from Vega, all that data and message that did .. well, you get the idea. It wouldn't have vanished anywhere, it'd be still there. Surely THAT would've been still proof of Extra-Terrestrial intelligence!
This movie is just such a mess .. I don't even want to read the book, which is probably better. The regular, non-fiction UFO books are actually much more interesting. Making a movie based on THEM would probably change human perceptions of larger masses... ah, this is Terra.. never mind, I forgot.
My point; this movie has no point. It's just a big moneymaker, lots of noise, effects, flashy crap and drama, signifying nothing.
"It is a
tale. Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing."
Sounds a lot like this movie, and describes it very well.
There was no point, beyond making some E.T.-obsessed, atheist hag (that never read even one UFO book or researched even one UFO sighting) crazy and possibly convert her to a crazy cat woman.
I mean, if THAT is how they contact primitive civilizations, then they might as well not do it whatsoever. Most of the people's lives were not altered, changed, or helped in any way, and most people would forget the whole thing quickly and the ignorant status quo would just remain.
It would be completely pointless - her story would be just ONE among zillions of true stories and crazy hallucinations about meeting otherplanetary people. And the denizens of this planet would react accordingly - not giving it much thought.
For it to have ANY kind of impact the way they claim it would, the CONTACT would have to have been much wider, perhaps world-wide, but at least to a much larger group of people, not just _ONE_, that can easily be labeled as a nutcase.
The way they supposedly went about it is the stupidest way possible, and the most pointless as well. They might as well not have done it.
By the way, if she really was considered crazy (which is pretty insane, all the effort considered), then .. what did people think about all those signals that DID come from Vega, all those blueprints that DID come from Vega, all that data and message that did .. well, you get the idea. It wouldn't have vanished anywhere, it'd be still there. Surely THAT would've been still proof of Extra-Terrestrial intelligence!
This movie is just such a mess .. I don't even want to read the book, which is probably better. The regular, non-fiction UFO books are actually much more interesting. Making a movie based on THEM would probably change human perceptions of larger masses... ah, this is Terra.. never mind, I forgot.
My point; this movie has no point. It's just a big moneymaker, lots of noise, effects, flashy crap and drama, signifying nothing.
"It is a
tale. Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing."
Sounds a lot like this movie, and describes it very well.
Yes. It's just a sci-fi movie and it could have been handled better (not sure what Sagan would have thought about the film....) But then; the point is to show one of the many possible scenarios of a "First Contact"-type encounter.
Trying to apply human reasoning to a non-human intelligence is pointless as well.
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The movie has a plot hole?!?
EVERY FRIGGIN' MOVIE HAS A FRIGGIN' PLOT HOLE!!!!! share
It sounds like the film went right over your head. Contact is not about alien invasions, UFOs, or monsters from outer space. It's an intelligent story for mature audiences about science vs. religion and how the two struggle to co-exist in our world. Ellie was a scientist who did not believe in God, and felt that people who did had simply deluded themselves as they could never offer any proof God existed. And then she goes through the wormhole and meets the aliens but now she can't prove it, so it becomes about her faith being questioned. The inquiry panel suggested that the signal from Vega had been faked by Haddon and that the machine didn't work (they thought she simply dropped through the rings), but what they couldn't deny was the fact Ellie's camera recorded 18 hours of static. But whether they believe her or not, Ellie knows there's something bigger out there in the universe, the way that people who believe in God are convinced of there being a higher power.
To suggest that the aliens should have made themselves known to the entire world all at once is missing the point of the film. It's a parallel to why doesn't God just show himself to everyone in the world instead of people just claiming that he exists because they want to believe in him (since you refer to Ellie as an "atheist hag", I'm assuming you're one of them). The key word here is faith.
I personally admired the film's nod to the possibility of a supreme being, therein not excluding viewers who might adhere to religion. When Ellie asks the alien messenger if they built the wormhole subway system and he replies that they didn't and don't know who did...it keeps one guessing as to just how far back natural creation goes and the nature of those creators, either ET, physics or other. It could have just been a naturally occurring wormhole system of course but that just begs the question, what else do we not know about our universe and how did all these fantastical systems come into existence in the first place?
Religious folk could very well have been worshipping science or nature itself the entire time. Same difference in many ways, so long as the answer is not known. And as Ellie eloquently states, the evidence is not sufficient to decide either way.
Doesn't the 18 hours of recorded static pretty much confirm it though? She approximated that she was in there for 18 hours, and then later someone else discovered that there was 18 hours recorded on the tape. So it seems like a very safe bet that it did happen and it's not really "faith" in the sense of blind belief. The only reason the population had to take it on faith was because the idiot in the government decided to cover it up.
shareI wouldn't say the 18 hours of static confirmed anything because it was just static and not actual video footage of her experience in the wormhole or on Vega, but it certainly goes some way to adding credibility to her story. It's still about accepting her story on faith though, and the end of the film leaves the point open where some believe her, some don't, and some don't know what to believe. Much like how society views religion and God (believers, atheists, agnostics, etc) with no solid proof either way.
shareTrue, it's not exactly a "confirmation" but it's still pretty strong, especially if she came up with the 18 hour estimate completely independently of the inspector finding 18 hours of static. Would be some coincidence for her to have randomly guessed the exact amount of time, especially being something like 18, and not a common number like 1 or 10.
So personally I think it's interesting that there was quite strong evidence supporting her theory but they decided to cover it up, probably so they could continue using the existing religions to control people, which doesn't even seem like the most prudent strategy because they could have just as easily used the alien theory to control them ("pay your taxes so we can build more alien equipment!" etc). IMO the writer included it intentionally as a jab at government coverups/corruption.
Precisely, it's not a confirmation but it gives Ellie's story some credibility. If we didn't have the 18 hours of static, the whole thing could have been dismissed (even by the audience watching the film) as some kind of hallucination she had, so the static is more of a suggestion that it was real - but without giving any concrete evidence. Much like religions are based around ideas of deities without any concrete proof they really exist - and yet millions of people still believe in them.
It could have been included as a jab at government cover-ups or corruption too, but it could also have been added to equalise the argument about science vs. faith which is really the heart of the film. The film won't give you overt proof it happened, but it will give you something to suggest it really did. And it inspires debate - which is exactly what we're all doing on these boards. It's one of the intelligent, thought-provoking aspects of this film that many people just don't get.