UNCUT - Contact (1997)

My favorite thing about this movie is the distinction it makes between science and religion but at the same time how they can be one in the same. You have a character whose life is based on what she can prove is real but this is turned on its head when she finds herself expecting everyone to believe her over something she can't prove. The thing that gets me is the one character that tells Ellie that 95% believes in a surpreme being in one form or another. But this very statement would negate the idea of religion being used as means of disqualifying her in the first place since this 95% of the population can't even agree on one God in the first place. You have Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, etc. all with their own belief in what they believe God to be so if they were expecting Ellie to answer that she believes in God she would be in the position to ask "which God?" What if she was a believer in a religion that very few people practice, would they disqualify her because that faith in that religion doesn't align with a religion that has a majority of believers?

Great observation at the end that the wormhole transit system had been there long before these aliens, so maybe they have their own greater aliens to wonder in awe about. The book covers this in a really interesting and to me a mind blowing way at the end.

"They should have sent a poet" (spoken by a scientist on a science mission) One of the most beautiful lines in movie history. Thank you Carl.

Note the use of "Spirit in the Sky" in the sequence of the diverse groups of people who have gathered at the VLA. This song is also used in "Apollo 13;" there seems to be an unwritten rule that intelligent space movies need to include it. John Hurt (S. R. Hadden) was an acclaimed English actor with an illustrious resume and was knighted in 2015, two years before his death. In addition to his roles in "Alien," which other commenters have mentioned, and "Snowpiercer," he provided the voice of Aragorn in the 1978 animated film of "The Lord of the Rings" and appeared in the title role of Doctor Who in that show's 50th anniversary special in 2013, in which Hurt played a hitherto unknown, secret incarnation of the Doctor. Oddly enough, in rewatching "Contact" I recognize Hurt's voice as that of Aragorn, but not as that of the Doctor; Hurt filmed "Contact" a little over halfway between the other two roles. Hadden's review of Ellie's resume includes one of those classic movie mistakes where the writers are tripped up by the peculiarities of particular institutions: Hadden says Ellie graduated magna cum laude from MIT, which does not in fact award Latin honors.

One of my very favorite movies ever, and loved your reaction. Also glad you both liked it.

"Who's Carl?" 🤣🤣🤣

I have fallen far behind in reacting to your reactions. In the case of "Contact," one reason for this was that, although I love the movie, part of me dreaded seeing it again because it is extremely emotional for me to watch. I majored in astronomy and physics in college but dropped out of grad school and now work in a totally different field, so the film reminds me of some of the choices in my life that I possibly should have made differently. Also, my late mother, the most intelligent person I have ever met, declined to watch "Contact" because she thought it was too intellectual for her, possibly due to an overly enthusiastic description of the opening scene on my part. Mom chose not to watch the movie even though she had listened to and greatly enjoyed the abridged audiobook of Carl Sagan's novel, narrated by Jodie Foster. As good as the movie is, the audiobook is even better, since, although the movie's cast is excellent, the audiobook has only Foster and no lesser actors. Foster's performance in the film is one of the most comprehensive movie star performances I have ever seen; she gets to play every imaginable human emotion, do action scenes and love scenes, and wear casual clothes, dressy clothes and a spacesuit. The only comparable performance I have seen is Vivien Leigh's in "Gone with the Wind." Many people assumed Foster would win an Oscar for the role, but she was not even nominated (Helen Hunt won for "As Good as it Gets"). This may have been for a sickeningly unfair reason: this was the year that Jodie Foster became pregnant and declined to reveal the identity of her child's biological father, and, as a result, Hollywood at large became aware for the first time that she is gay (although she did not come out officially until some years later). Sadly, viewers of Alex and Josh's age may not remember who Carl Sagan was. He was Neil deGrasse Tyson's mentor and was the Neil deGrasse Tyson of his own era; the finest compliment I can pay to both men is to leave the explanation at that. (Tyson even hosted the reboot of Sagan's science documentary TV series, "Cosmos.") Sagan originally developed "Contact" as a film treatment but published it as a novel in 1985. He tried to get the movie made for the rest of his life, dying in 1996 during the film's production (and, unfortunately, not living to shoot his planned cameo in the movie). There is a YouTube video that explores and explains "That Shot" in "Contact." While the video is about the medicine cabinet mirror shot, there are in fact three shots in the film's first hour which could be described that way, beginning with the opening shot of the movie. As Josh pointed out, this shot not only reminds us of the immensity of the universe but of how signals from Earth get older the farther out in space you are, setting up much of the film's plot. This was the longest uninterrupted effects shot in movie history up to that time. "That guy" (Ted Arroway/the alien) is actor David Morse. Robert Zemeckis said he cast Morse because he was not a sufficiently famous actor for the audience to assume he would reappear later in the movie after Ellie's father dies, allowing his role as the alien to be a surprise. My mother would have taken issue with this premise, having greatly enjoyed Morse's work on the medical dramedy "St. Elsewhere," of which she was a huge fan. If she had watched "Contact," she probably would indeed have guessed that Morse would reappear in some capacity. Both the Arecibo Telescope in Puerto Rico and the Very Large Array in New Mexico were actual astronomical installations, and "Contact" filmed at both locations. The VLA is still in operation, but, as other commenters have mentioned, the Arecibo Telescope collapsed in 2020, another factor that makes the film depressing in retrospect. "That guy" (Kent Clark) is actor William Fichtner, who has also appeared in "Armageddon," "The Perfect Storm," "Black Hawk Down," "The Dark Knight," and many other films and TV shows. The Kent Clark character was based on real-life SETI astronomer Kent Cullers, who was also blind; he passed away in 2021 at the age of 71. As I mentioned in my comment on the Target Audience reaction to TNG: "Who Watches the Watchers," I am fascinated (and sometimes unsettled) by the intersections between religion and pop culture. Although the beliefs of an actor should make no difference to the roles they can take, I find it fascinating that, in real life, Jodie Foster is an atheist and Matthew McConaughey is a Christian, exactly like their characters in this film. People habitually remembered the order of the planets outward from the Sun using various mnemonic phrases, causing dismay when Pluto was demoted from planetary status, rendering several such phrases unusable. My own preferred and up-to-date mnemonic is, "Matilda visits every Monday. Just stays until noon," although you still need to remember that Mercury is closest to the Sun and Mars is the next out from Earth. (You could also use "Maps’ vital errors may just seem unacceptable, Nomad!", which I coined while commenting snarkily on the chart of Earth's solar system including Pluto in TOS: "The Changeling.") The medicine cabinet mirror shot is, of course, especially impressive because it is a oner beginning with Ellie at the bottom of the stairs; thus, the implication is that the mirror impossibly "saw" down the stairs and around the corner, creating a disorienting effect that matches the tragedy of the scene. Actor Henry Strozier (the minister), who the two of you said sounds like the present-day Tom Hanks, is in fact best known as a narrator and voice actor, but also played U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk in the fact-based thriller "Thirteen Days." Despite having been twice nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award, he does not presently have a Wikipedia article. The tracking shot of Ellie running into the VLA control room is the third of "the shots" which I mentioned; it is another "impossible" shot because the camera follows Ellie all the way from outside into the building, which it would not have been physically able to do (there was some sort of disguised wipe or other transition when Foster went through the exterior door). Vega is the brightest star in Lyra (the constellation of the Lyre) and is one of the three stars that form what is known in the Northern Hemisphere as the Summer Triangle, along with Deneb and Altair. When I was briefly an astronomy grad student, I attended an observatory event at which one of the volunteers tried to make astronomy more "relevant" by referring to Vega as "the movie star star." I don't think this was particularly effective, since "Contact" was already four years old at that point and had not been a major hit; in a defeat for thoughtful, realistic science fiction, it had been overwhelmed at the box office by the original "Men in Black." Bill Clinton did not, in fact, record footage for this movie, although several other celebrities appear as themselves, including Larry King, Jay Leno and Ann Druyan, Carl Sagan's widow. Sagan's book features a fictional female president. Zemeckis originally also intended to use a fictional president and considered either Sidney Poitier or Linda Hunt for the role (younger viewers may need to be reminded that there had not yet been a Black U.S. president in 1997). Zemeckis' plans changed when Bill Clinton made the statement excerpted in the film, which was actually about a meteorite discovered in Antarctica which was believed at the time to contain possible evidence of ancient microbial life on Mars (an interpretation that has since fallen into disfavor). Zemeckis was especially struck by the line, "We will continue to listen closely to what it has to say," which fit the film's plot so perfectly. I suspect that some of the scenes with Angela Bassett's character would instead have featured the fictional President if Clinton had not made that speech. (more to come)

Very probably YouTube's algorithm was somehow aware that "Contact" was coming up as TA's next lottery reaction. I apologize for the fact that the film I have entered in the lottery (hoping for good luck tonight!) is also over two hours long, but I think it's worth the time.

You should check out Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind. Another first-contact movie and one of my favorites.

@2:28 or so, great insight Josh

Though aliens may not have the Periodic Table of Elements, as Earthlings have designed it, the elements on the table are the same no matter where you are in the universe. The number on the table is based on the amount of electrons in the atom. It wouldn't be hard to tell someone which elements to use, once you translate the message. If you tell them element 26, it's always going to be iron. If you tell them element 79, it's always going to be gold. If an element has one electron more or less, it's now a different element.

The science in the movie is really accurate (not taking into account SF elements of course), up to the lack of funding for SETI research and people taking credits for the work of others 😂 If the aliens wanted to send us a message, this is pretty much what scientists expect it to look like. In fact we sent a much shorter message like this ourselves in 1974 and Carl Sagan helped designing it.

I don't believe James Woods' character didn't believe Jodie Foster. I think he was ignoring the recording time of the static because he is a big government guy, and he wanted it kept secret.

Judging from your movie references, I assume you've never seen "Alien" (1979). Both the actors, Drummlin (Tom Skerritt) & Hadden (John Hurt), were in there.

Carl in the ending credits was Carl Sagan, the author of the book this movie was based on and possibly the greatest science communicator ever alive. If you have a chance, check out Pale Blue Dot video on youtube, it will blow your mind (you could even react to it).

Prime Numbers. The alien force used prime numbers to communicate with Earth. So did Picard in S3E18 "Allegiance" when he tried to communicate with his unknown captors. Math is the universal language.

I love the fact that first contact is light, the fastest thing in the universe. Just mentioning again, this was written by an astrophysicist, Carl Sagan, who's career involved not only the Voyager projects but also bridging science to the public.

The Arecibo Observatory wasn't just a real place, and not just defunked and lost to time now, but cameras recorded the wires failing and the suspended instruments falling into the dish. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u34uwFOCM-4 Desperately securing funding for astronomy isn't just a convenient plot point in the movie, but a painful reality for those who select it as a career. Astronomy does not generate novel materials or technologies, it never returns on any investment. All it does is enrich the minds and the spirits of the the species who spend any time on it. And that's the thing with priceless gifts, it's impossible to ever put the right number on them.

There are two films called Contact that were released in 1997. The other one is a South Korean romance film. It would have been funny, if you started watching the wrong one, thinking: "What is this, and when do these subtitles go away?"

This movie is a superb reflection of the 90s Zeitgeist: Everything is possible for the US. Everything is possible for capitalism. But why should we do it? We have no idea. Let's have fun!

Good pick. Enjoy this movie for many of the same reasons I enjoy Signs: it's a movie about faith pretending to be a movie about aliens. ofc, Contact is by far the better executed of the two.

Partial SPOILER for the novel........There is proof of Ellie having travelled and encountered aliens. It is in the form of an insight into mathematics the aliens give the five scientists who make the Machine trip. Hidden within transcendental numbers are messages (think of them as numbers with 'storage space'). So Ellie begins the computer analysis and finds the first level of embedded information. The character played by McConaughey is a composite of two different religious characters in the novel, one more trustworthy and devout than the other.

Yea, I won something or something. I really do enjoy this movie and I think it is great Sci-fi that is thought provoking and interesting. I guess I have to come up with a new movie to add back to the list since I managed to get one in here.

Have you guys seen the James Bond movie Goldeneye? It uses the antenna you liked the look of.

2:41:12 It's not simply spelled-out in the film, but the star Vega is 26 light-years from Earth. That means it is as far away as it takes light to travel in 26 years. If the broadcast of Hitler opening the 1936 Olympics was made that year, then signals from that would have arrived at Vega in 1962. The signal sent back from Vega would have taken another 26 years to get from there to here. (Presumably the aliens would have sent it 11 years later, in 1971, after discovering it, analyzing it, and re-broadcasting it so that it arrived back here in 1997.) [Vega is actually closer to 25 light-years away. It's not very likely that signals from Earth received at Vega would be intelligible because they would be so weak. Phenomenons such as light (electromagnetic radiation) and gravity are subject to Inverse-Square law: doubling the distance apart makes for one-fourth of the intensity or brightness. You can also think about this like throwing a stone into a still pool of water: the waves/ripples created radiate outwards and diminish the further out from where the stone hit the water.]

Glad you guys liked the movie, and great reaction. I love it, obviously, but the odd thing is that even though I enjoyed it the first time I saw it, I didn't really start to love it until I saw it again years later. It is one of the movies that the late film critic Roger Ebert increased his rating on. His initial review just had it as 3.5 stars and he enjoyed it. About 14 years later he upped his rating to 4 stars (out of 4) and put it on his "Great Movies" list alongside many classics. It is one of those movies where I think time and thinking about it can really increase appreciation of it above the first viewing, even though it gives a good impression on first viewing as well. There are multiple scenes I get chills and tear up, especially the hearing scene near the end where she gives her speech. I have seen Arrival once, and enjoyed it, but not quite on the level of Contact, personally, but maybe I should also give it another watch. I don't think a reveal of some kind of alien creature or humanoid alien would have worked in Contact like in Arrival, having a short scene where you see an alien like that would have easily made it feel like a different movie suddenly. Instead the aliens did a holodeck-like thing for her, with her Pensacola drawing and her dad. I think it was probably the right choice given what the film was trying to do, and what it was about. And I think you guys didn't recognize a few of the actors - Drumlin was Tom Skerritt, who was in Top Gun and Alien (he played Captain Dallas). S.R. Hadden was played by John Hurt, who was also in Alien (he played Kane, who had the alien burst out of his chest) and was Ollivander the wand-maker in Harry Potter.

2:39:57 Yes, the Periodic Table would be the same there and everywhere.

I like that what happened was not ambiguous, to those in the know (e.g. the "secret report").

2:24:18 Carl Sagan. He wrote the novel that this film is based upon.

I found the analogy between "did you love your dad" and "does god exist" questions complete bullshit. Yeah Matt, the feelings of you loving your god and me loving my dad may not be quantifiable, but I have proof that my dad existed. Great movie, regardless.

The experiment is completely repeatable, though. Just send more people.

Figures, I have a ton of chores today to get done, have to watch later tonight. But i anticipate you guys enjoyed this. This one hit me kinda hard when it was first released, I saw it in a theater, my father had just passed away a couple of months before. He passed at 59 years old, still young and the whole family was hit hard by it. I'm 62 now and I'm always looking over my shoulder for the swinging scythe.

"For Carl" Carl Sagan, famous astrophysicist, wrote the book but died before they completed the movie. The Arecibo Observatory was, until recently, a real place. In the end, she learns "Faith". Not religion, not God. She learns the concept of faith in the unprovable.

Still one of my favorite lines: “First rule in government spending: why build one when you can have two at twice the price?”

5:31 No, the telephone is not a radio frequency transmission.

"Now this react was great, they had a lot of thoughtful things to say, they seem to have really enjoyed-" Alex: "AN HOUR LEFT?????" "Son of a-"

I know what I'll be watching tonight! Can't wait to see what you think of it... I love it

I love this movie so much. Hope you do too!

I needed this right now.

Ahhh Sunday morning delight!

Can't wait to watch along with you!!!