User Comments for Contact

Muhammad (10 out of 10 )
Its a very good movie about new inovation.

Alan (9 out of 10 )
A brilliant film about the struggle between science and faith. Ellie is the stalwart atheist throughout the film but is forced to redefine her views on faith after she has an experience of life shattering proportions and is left without knowing whether or not it really happened. The film portrays the radical insanity of the truely atheist and religious sides of the spectrum and how they both ignore the undeniable simplicity of the center position. The religion of the self. That is to say, common sense exists, trust your senses and your instincts, and have "faith" in what you come to believe.

Stephen Burns (10 out of 10 )
I think this script was amazing. It is a timeless struggle between two extremes. I love it. Amazingly written. I have never seen the movie, but the script is absolutely amazing. I am going to rent this movie tonight. I have to see it after reading the script.

Teod (8 out of 10 )
The script here contains several scenes which were fused together in the film to reduce the overall length, as well as a number of very nice scenes not in the movie at all: most notably the reappearance of the wormhole at the end. The final film version certainly contains a number of significant changes with respect to the novel: Ellie doesn't have a romance with Palmer Joss, but with a scientist character named Der Heer, who wasn't in the film. Der Heer's and Palmer Joss' characters were collapsed into one. Palmer Joss, in the book, is the more opened minded of two characters "representing" Christianity. These change was probably to reduce the number of characters in the movie to make it more consumable for "hollywood" audiences. Acceptable. The romance element is arguable more interesting because of this new tension of convictions. The novel also has five(!) people going to Vega, each more or less representing an ethnicity of earth. Again, looks like something that got axed for the sake of "clarity" (simplicity) and drama. Can't say that this change was worth it. Why does a plot always have to come down to one person? Who says that presenting the story with a personal emphasis requires only one person going to Vega? On the one hand too much "lone hero syndrome" and on the other it's unrealistic. Also, there are some extremely nice things that occur in the novel between the five final candidates, which would have added depth to the film. The novel postulates a fictional President Lasker - MS President Lasker. Perhaps a "new" directors cut will come out, with the Mr Clinton scenes replaces with Mrs Clinton scenes? Finally, at the end of the novel, there is a very suspenseful scene whose cut for me is unfathomable. It's even more dramatic and meaningful than the wormhole ending of the script on this site. It picks up on the theme that even the extraterrestrial civilization that sent the Machine Message are themselves capable of experiencing awe (in the book, the "numinous"). That the wormhole system interconnecting the galaxy/universe was built by an even more advanced civilization so powerful that they could write their signature into the very fabric of spacetime. Ted Arroway II, gives Ellie a hint where this signature might be found. At the end of Contact, the novel, a supercomputer programmed by Ellie to calculate the number "pi" to the "zillionth" place begins to sound alarm because it finds a new "message" hidden within the number itself - a feat that only an intelligence capable of altering or redefining the structure of the universe itself could do. THAT'S deep. Too bad Hollywood didn't GET it. I wonder if Zemeckis himself DID want to include this scene? After all a good film can always appeal to different audiences at the same time without losing its overall effectiveness. Quoting Hadden and some GOOD dialog from the movie adaptation: "An alien intelligence is going to be more advanced. That means efficiency functioning on multiple levels and in multiple dimensions". If a remake of the film were ever to happen, I hope the makers have what it takes to be just that.

TEOD (9 out of 10 )
Hmmm. Is it possible that the "script" here is in fact the actual working script / working screenplay and the differences between it and the "transcript" of the film are ALL the result of directorial / directorial changes? BTW. There really are some nice ideas in THIS script, like the scenes showing the technological buildup to and the actual construction and testing of the MACHINE in more detail. The scene where the antiaccelerant internal atmosphere causes a technicians death has some particularly good dramatic value -- makes the possibility of dying in it all the more tangible. While I gave the film an 8, I think the script deserves a 9 out of 10.

Drake (9 out of 10 )
A very good film that keeps your interest. Very similar to another sci-fi movie "Signs" but has a changed meaning to the plot. Very good scene where Jodie sees her father as she enters the machine. An emotional scene that catches your interest to watch the rest.

Lance Marchetti (6 out of 10 )
Brilliant movie. Just a pity it was charged with a bias that screams faith is not logically soluble with 'science'. This misleads the audience to think that the presuppositions it portrays regarding our existence in the universe are ones we should all be believing. And that there is no definite answers to life, and the afterlife. And certainly not in that untrustworthy piece of literature called the Bible. Thanks Carl Sagan. For yet again giving us nothing tangible to take with us when we peg off.

Add your own comment