Date: Fri 17-Oct-1997

Publication: Bee

Author: DONNAM

Quick Words:

Contact-Playing-Foster-Gump

Full Text:

(rev "Contact" for Now Playing, 10/17/97)

Now Playing--

How to Follow A Mega Hit? Contact!

By Trey Paul Alexander III

If you had directed Forrest Gump , how would you follow it up? Think about it:

Forrest Gump became one of the biggest moneymakers of all time; birthed an

ubiquitous catch phrase ("Life is like a box of chocolates..."); garnered star

Tom Hanks' second straight Academy Award win for Best Actor, as well as

snagging Oscars for Best Picture and Best Director; and merged uncanny effects

work (Gump shakes hand with President Kennedy) with elegant storytelling. What

do you do? If you're director Robert Zemeckis, you bring a 1985 best-selling

novel by Carl Sagan to life and end up with what was the summer's most

intelligent popcorn movie.

Contact , playing this week at the Edmond Town Hall Theater, is yet another

film in Hollywood's flavor-of-the-month genre, the alien movie (i e,

Independence Day , Mars Attacks , Men In Black , the upcoming Alien sequel,

etc). Yet this ambitious flick seeks not just a rousing display of thrilling

visual effects and distracting eye-candy, but strives to provide an exercise

for both the eyes and the mind as it grapples with the question of whether

mankind is alone in the universe and what kind of implications the search for

intelligent life elsewhere have upon personal and religious beliefs.

The superb Jodie Foster, who last appeared on screen in 1994's Nell , portrays

dogged scientist Dr Ellie Arroway. The electricity of her performance, not the

flashy effects, is what propels this film. Arroway is a relentlessly

determined individual obsessed with finding proof that there are voices to be

heard out in the stars. Working under the SETI program (Search for

ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence), Arroway uses its array of radio telescopes to

search the heavens for alien messages. Eventually, she hits what she believes

to be the jackpot, a signal from the star Vega, and the debate -- which

involves her boss (Tom Skerritt), the government, and an ex-lover (Matthew

McConaughey) -- is on as to how best to proceed after the reception of this

potentially earth-shattering news.

Debate fuels the first half of the film as Arroway faces off against foe after

foe in the scientific community who tell her that her search is in vain and an

indefensible waste of government funds. But perhaps the most compelling

dialectic posed comes courtesy of the spiritual guru played by McConaughey,

who also serves as the romantic interest. He counters the convictions of

Arroway, an atheist who can find no discernible proof for the existence of

God, with the question, How can a scientist, particularly one searching for

evidence of life out in the great beyond, not believe in the existence of God?

This philosophical tug-of-war provides rich subtext for a film that gains

momentum in its second half as the implications of Arroway's discovery leads

to the crafting of an elaborate vehicle whose purpose is to transport a single

human occupant/ambassador to the distant star. Here, Zemeckis' exceptional

craftsmanship shines, as the gusto of the movie's visual effects matches the

aforementioned intensity of Foster's performance. But Zemeckis also knows that

bells and whistles alone do not a superior climax make, so he also loads the

finale with plot twists, mysteries and ambiguities that would fit in with the

narrative maneuverings of "The X-Files."

Contact , rated PG for mild profanity and suggestive sexual content, may not

have taken the world by storm as Zemeckis' Forrest Gump did, but driven by the

sheer force of Foster's performance and the steady, guiding hand of Zemeckis,

it proves to be an immensely satisfying, if just short of epically stirring,

motion picture. Alas, if only more summer flicks strove for the depth and

complexity to which this movie aspires.