Arrival

‘Arrival’ is a wonderful film. Amy Adams plays Dr Louise Banks, a world-renowned professor of comparative linguistics with nothing in her life but her work who is recruited by the US military to help them translate alien communications from a series of spaceships which have arrived at various locations around the world. However, all is not as it seems. We learn from when Banks encounters the aliens ‘Heptapods’ of a tragedy in her past, which seriously threatens her relationship with theoretical physicist Jeremey Renner, her ability to work with the aliens and consequently her ability to try and prevent a global war. Though it is an intensely clever film, it is really really rewarding if you stick with it and try and figure out what is actually going on. The film itself is visually awesome – look out for one of the alien ships anti-gravity antechamber – and you will be hooked from beginning to end. Arrival is not only a fantastically entertaining film but it will also challenge your perception of how you see, think of and experience the world around you in a novel and unique way. If you were a fan of films like Interstellar or Inception, you will definitely not want to miss watching Arrival because, as sci-fi goes, in recent years it really does not get much better.

Hamish Brown