Ancient Logic

For my second year-end post, I'd like to talk about movies. There are five movies that stuck with me this year, perhaps not the five best movies, but certainly good ones that meant something to me. From my limited perspective as a routine movie-goer the gap between blockbuster movies and "quality films" continues to grow each year. Are these even in the same genre anymore? While certainly the basic technology employed by movies and films is the same (except when it isn't) the point of films seems to be diverging. The point of a movie like Marvel's Captain America: Civil War is to serve as the vehicle for cathartic spectacle while the point of my favorite movie is something closer to communication - the passing on of knowledge to the audience. In principle, I enjoy both modes but I wish they would cross-pollinate a bit more. It is the rare movie, (The Lord of Rings Trilogy, Star Wars, and Interstellar come to mind) that seems to want to do both: to create a grand ...

Every moment is an arrival; its passing a departure. I wonder how this movie will be viewed in years to come. Prescient or the last gasp of a dying order? The movie, Arrival, released this weekend to overwhelming positive reviews paints a simple but nuanced perspective of the universe. Do we still live in a universe capable of nuance? Based on a beautiful short story by Ted Chiang, (The Story of Your Life), Arrival is essentially a first-contact story. And parts of it reminded me of "Contact," although I like this movie considerably more. This is a cerebral movie, unafraid to let powerful images and solid acting deliver its message rather than spectacle (although there is certainly a little of that, too). It's also an excellent movie, probably my favorite depiction of First Contact in movies, owing the simple fact that the movie is unafraid to depict truly alien aliens and their profound impact on truly human humans. Adams plays Louise Banks, a linguist brought into...