I am ashamed to admit that I had not seen Villaneuve’s Arrival until last week. This film has everything I could have asked for and more. My obsession with how time is perceived and portrayed in film, is best exemplified and justified by Arrival. The audience is lead to believe that the beginning of the film is always the beginning of the story and Villaneuve uses this to his advantage. The beginning is actually the end. The scenes of her daughter growing up and then tragically dying are kind of like flashbacks. It is difficult to classify the flashbacks as flashbacks since we discover that in some way, the character is living through these flashbacks in the present, so it is almost revelation like.

The opening scene is probably the most important scene, because again the scene is not bound by time and is our first exposure to how Villaneuve embodies so much meaning in such a small space. Almost ironically Louise, played by Amy Adams, says “I used to think this was the beginning of your story. Memory is a strange thing. It does not work like I thought it did. We are so bound by time. By its order…But now I’m not so sure I believe in beginnings and endings. There are days that define your story beyond your life. Like the day they arrived”… reinforcing that time does not exist in this film, yet we are conditioned to think otherwise. The slow movement of the camera, panning from the top until the windows are in frame, we see the two almost empty wine glasses on the table, as the camera zooms closer into the garden and lake. This is also the same house amy adams’ character raises her daughter, with revelations of them playing in the garden and near the lake. The importance of this house and more specifically the living room, is the comparison between Louise’s house and the place where the aliens arrived. Between her and the extraterrestrial beings is a glass like barrier, which alludes to how she gains the ability to see into the future… by breaking the glass. In none of the future scenes, is she restricted by anything… its almost as if on purpose Villanueve makes sure there is nothing between Louise and the camera, to explain that Louise is almost transcendental as she learns the language of the aliens and thus knows of her future.

Since this film is a generally slow places and meaningful film, the takes are long, camera movements are slow. After watching the film many times, it occured to me that Villanueve would have times the shots and the pace in which they slowly zoom in. The intro, the classroom and when we see the inside of the alien ship(at 3:00 mark), the camera movements are identical.It is interesting to note that Villanueve has many shots of the alien ship at the background, following his character Louise. Rather than having continuous wide shots, he uses continues mid shots with Louise in focus almost manoeuvring the direction of the camera with the spaceship in the background. The sound scape in this film is very minimalistic and clean. There is one song used in the most intense scenes of the film, which is a composition of strings that make the audience feel nostalgic and the slow pace of the beginning of the song matches the equally slow movement of the camera. Depending on which scene the song is placed, the music can entice nostalgia or sadness and anxiety.

Almost ironically I would describe Arrival as a timeless film. Villanueve not only created the most realistic film about the existence of aliens, he also created a non linear storyline unlike anything I have ever seen. While high budget films are criticised for being too extravagant and killing the art of cinema, this film is an ode to all the high budget crap films that they have no excuse for not using their expensive gear and high paid actors to create something amazing.