Customer Ratings & Reviews

Put on your thinkers cap for this emotional sci-fi drama. You'll be drawn in from the opening shot to a surprise ending. Subdued yet strong performances by Amy and Jeremy.

Canadian Denis Villeneuve is one of the most brilliant filmmakers alive, having just come off of a string of five consecutive masterpieces, starting with "Polytechnique" in 2009 and proceeding with "Incendies", "Prisoners", "Enemy", and last year's "Sicario" (my favorite film of 2015). Known for bending viewers' minds with provocative movies that sometimes require copious thought to unlock their meanings, "Arrival" is not an exception. Ostensibly an alien-invasion movie about an expert linguist who is called upon to decode the language of arriving aliens in order to communicate with them, the film reaches so much further, even to primal questions of human existence. It is a hard film to discuss because it contains a bona-fide puzzle a viewer must unlock (involving time and, possibly, other dimensions) in order to even approach the film's meaning. If one 'gets' it, the film's denouement can be an emotional epiphany for the viewer; if not, one might flounder in enigmas upon leaving the theater. The film's genius is that either way the viewer should find this film haunting him for days after, perhaps taunting him to unlock its secrets. A second viewing is virtually a necessity, not only to study its careful plotting but also to appreciate its emotional resonances one has been too busy to appreciate upon first viewing, and it is a revelation upon seeing it again to find that the film has completely 'played fair,' providing visual and audio clues that had passed unnoticed. Amy Adams plays the linguist with such deep sincerity and total commitment, so important when one realizes that she is the true center of the film -- and Villeneuve, along with cinematographer Bradford Young, has supplied visuals so breathtakingly stunning you might have to pinch yourself to believe what your eyes are seeing. The visuals are also matched by the remarkable score by Icelandic composer Jóhann Jóhannsson (who had teamed with Villeneuve on "Prisoners" and "Sicario") using vocals and experimental piano 'loops' to put viewers into an other-worldly state of being. It is such an audacious, creative piece of intelligent, adult science fiction (something rarely encountered today), the thoughtful, open-minded viewer should embrace this as a gem for both the mind and heart, and not hold against it that it is less interested in the usual science fiction tropes than the light and dark paradigms of human existence.

Arrival is a film that asks what would happen if aliens were real, and how we would react to their presence. The exploration of plausible alien communication is fascinating. Beautifully shot and imagined.

I can watch this movie time and time again. Each time I notice small details that keep the movie interesting. I like the message of language and sharing amongst the 12 countries where the spaceships hover.

Arrival is a movie that truly makes you think. It's use of symbolism and slow-story telling creates an atmosphere great for any viewer. Expect it to be slow, but the payoff at the end is worth the wait.

Put your thinking caps on for this one. the movie is engaging but you have to very observant and follow every minute of the movie to figure out the end of the movie. But if you get it, it is mind blowing.

We have watched this several times and always notice something new with each viewing. Brilliant script, fine acting and knock-out score keeps drawing us back. Do yourself a favor and check it out.

This is a smart, thoughtful science fiction take that I highly recommend. I recently upgraded to the 4K version just to be able to soak in more details. The audio is absolutely incredible...

If you’re a fan of hard sci-fi and very heady themes, his is perfect for you. If you’re a fan of the director too, this is a darn great film.

Not much of an interesting plot, relying on special effects to hold the viewer's attention. Probably not something I would want to watch again.

This movie was a little boring and really didn't get what it was about. I wasn't satisfied with it. I thought the premise of the movie was interesting. I think that if we do encounter the good kind of alien we would have to figure out a way to communicate. It never actually answers why they come though which disappointed me with no great conclusion. If I were to recommend this it would have to be to a hard core alien searcher.

I got this as a gift for my father-in-law after my brother-in-law and I were raving about it to him. Best Director making movies today, can’t wait for Dune.

Awesome UFO movie! Great cast and well written. Buy it!

Though I wish they would of gone a bit more creative since the movie is so out there, its still a decent steelbook

Very classy and beautiful steelbook for any collection. The movie is very engaging and will make any movie buff happy.

This movie was great. I liked because it kept you on the seat of your pants. Was a challenge to figure out why the aliens came to our planet. Great ending

Great performances, compelling story and themes, technical aspects are astounding and top notch direction! A must see for both sci-fi and movie fans alike!

A wonderful cast that is superb! Amy Adam's is wonderful as the code breaker Dr. Louise Banks. It is definitely worth watching more than once!

Here we have some legitimate science fiction, and it's definitely thought provoking as good SF should be. This could have been adapted from a story by Isaac Asimov or Phillip K. Dick or someone. (Eh actually I'm not sure it wasn't based on a Dick story.) Anyway, the plot is actually pretty original, the characters are mostly interesting, the dialog is good, and the tone is just about pitch perfect. I suspect that those who are parents might appreciate this even more than I did. I saw it twice in the theater, and it was well worth it. Initially, I did kind of feel like they played a little bit of dirty pool with the plot at one point - I don't want to say more and spoil it for someone who hasn't seen it - but after more consideration and some good conversations with my friends and family, I reached a different conclusion. This will mess with your mind a little bit, but not in bad way. This is the kind of movie that provokes interesting discussions with the people you watch it with - and the kind of thing you're happy to recommend to anyone who asks. It's not perfect; there are some irritatingly stereotypical (and rather flat) characters driving key plot points - but overall this is a very worthwhile movie.

I don't have a 4K tv or UHD Blu player to watch this on yet, but it comes with the regular Blu-ray and I figured it was worth few extra bucks now instead of double-dipping in a few years. This was one of my favorite films of 2016 when I saw it in the theater. Denis Villenueve (director of SICARIO and INCENDIES) has given us an intelligent slow burn sci-fi film without excessive explosions or idiotic robots battling while looking like a spinning levitating trash heap (I'm looking at you Mr. Bay). If you like smart sci-fi, or are a bit of a language geek who has been waiting for a major film to make a linguist the main character, you should definitely check out ARRIVAL, otherwise you should still check it out for the excellent performance by Amy Adams so you can join the rest of us who think she was robbed of an Oscar nomination (perhaps instead of Meryl Streep getting nominated for an ok comedy). I can't comment on the 4K & HDR quality, but have heard good reviews of it being a noticeable improvement over the 1080p Blu version despite being a 2K mastered film up-scaled to 4K (as unfortunately happens on a number of modern films, probably so they can save time/money -- LA LA LAND was shot on film, reportedly scanned at 5K and had digital intermediate done at 2K and then got bumped up to 4K for theaters and UHD). I would prefer if all 4K releases had DI done in 4K instead of 2K, but if its done well and colors in HDR are done well, it can still be worth a few bucks for the upgrade