ARRIVAL (science V.S fantasy)
Among of the eight stories that I had learnt in class, I would like to choose number 3-Cinderella. After I research the myth of Cinderella stories, the movie that I’ve picked up in order to compare the story of “Arrival” is the first “Shrek” film that directed by Andrew Adamson and Vicky Jenson.
“Shrek” is an American computer animated fantasy-comedy film whereas “Arrival” is a science fiction film that leans into feeling and thinking, and reminds you again that there’s more to this genre than heavy artillery. Arrival listed as a parental guidance movie (PG-13) which much more concerned with deep truths about language, imagination and human relationship where the bittersweet feeling instantly settles over the whole film.
On the other hand, Shrek includes some edgy humor directed at teens and adults where the movie display plenty of potty humor and gross-out jokes at kids mostly based on the appalling personal habits of ogres. For example scary scene for young ones includes fights with villagers coming after Shrek with pitchforks.
In term the lead character of story, Linguist Luise Banks is a strong, independent girl who having done translations for military intelligent, is recruited to decipher the sound and speech of an alien squid race that have “arrived”. In contrast, Shrek is living in isolation in the swamp and begins the series as an unsociable hermit where he prides himself on being a big, green, terrifying ogre and is ill-tempered and mean.
In my opinion, Shrek does contain many straight forward deeper moral messages for its audience. The biggest moral of the film is the wrongfulness of judging people by their appearances alone. Shrek is the big orge who lives alone in the woods, feared by all the people in the land of Duloc people because of his scary appearance.
In the story, Shrek keeps people away because he doesn’t feel worthy of love since he’s been so hurt in the past that he refuses to let genuine friend like Donkey into his life. The imperfect people deserves happy endings too. You don’t have to be a perfectly princess to have a fairytale ending. We should all spend less time trying to be the "ideal" person and more time celebrating our uniqueness. Rewards achieved through transformed circumstances. Eventually, we will find people who love us for who we really are.
Besides, Shrek highlights the importance of companionship where everybody needs friend and family to offer some form of support and comfort as Shrek who wants at the beginning of the movie to be left alone but he learns by the end that no man (or orge) is an island.
However, there are no clear messages in Arrival because it seems to have an underlying pro-life message which in pro-living, pro-heartbreak, pro-people and pro-humanity kind of way. The movie presented some interesting ideas, but it actually left me with a lot of questions particularly that question is one of motherhood. For instance, the choice to become a mother whether or not their children will be brought into this world once they are here, what kind of life they will have. Time. It’s one of the most constant things in our lives, and yet Arrival gives us a reality in which time is relative. It’s statistically shown that language can change our thinking patterns, but this movie postulates that language can actually teach you how to experience time in a non-linear fashion.
In order to make the decision on the same or different path for every choices while knowing what will happen next, it’s a matter of choices. As we move rapidly into a world of freedom which may allow early detection for diseases and abnormalities, selection based on gender and possibly other factors soon. These ethical issues deserve consideration. Literally, it is for life.
Last but not least, Shrek is a very witty and enjoyable movie with good comic timing, perfect satire, and perfectly captured characters. Hence, it does feature many moral messages for its audience especially in today’s self-centered and image-conscious society.
Furthermore, Arrival is a stunning fiction movie with deep implication as for today specifically how language shapes reality. This firm’s premise hinges on the idea, shared by many philosophers of language that we do not all experience the same reality. The pieces of it are the same that we live on the same planet, breathe the same air but our perceptions of those pieces shift and change based on the words and grammar we use to describe them to ourselves and each other.
