Arrival is one of a fresh wave of highly polished science fiction films prioritizing strong philosophical and social messaging over pure spectacle and adventure-seeking wish fulfillment. In recent years these have ranged from more conventionally structured features like Mad Max: Fury Road to more abstracted stories leaning more on symbolism and metaphor to make their points. Under the Skin and more recently Annihilation both fit this description.

Somewhere between these is Arrival. It’s a film that’s mostly straightforward plot wise while relying on genre fiction techniques to set up some huge payoffs and send its message. There’s so much to say about this film and a lot of ink has already been spilled going over what it explores regarding determinism, the way language shapes our thinking, and how maybe trying to understand each other better is the ideal long-term strategy for us as a species and civilization. These are all great to think about, but I want to unpack something else. The choice Louise (Amy Adams) makes in the final moments and why.

In the film’s opening and scattered throughout the remainder, Louise has flashes of time spent with her daughter Hannah over the course of the child’s life up to her death at a young age from a rare and incurable disease. Through clever editing and good acting, we’re led to believe these are flashbacks. The impression given is this all took place before she is brought in to bridge the communications gap with the alien visitors. But as she gains an incremental understanding of their language, she begins to likewise adopt their broader perception of time. She then realizes, along with the audience, the memories of her daughter are the future.

After her new ability is used to avert a global disaster (main plot: resolved), there’s still a lingering question. Will she follow through on this future of pain and loss or will she hide from it, reverting to her previous life; protected, but alone and isolated from both the pains and joys of a life lived?

There is no ambiguity as to what she’ll do. One of her final lines is a bold declaration to herself:

“Despite knowing the journey and where it leads I embrace it and I welcome every moment of it”.

Beyond this statement, there is no unpacking of her decision. As she speaks, a montage of flash-forwards show the path she has set herself on, right up to Hannah’s still inevitable death. Her reasoning all the while is left up to the viewer’s interpretation.

It’s possible she’s wary of creating a paradox; that she feels bound by causality to follow through with what she was shown. After all, how could she get visions of a future that doesn’t end up happening? This sense of obligation to the fate of the world and the timeline she’s put into motion allows her to accept the pain of what’s to follow as necessary and in service to a greater good.

During the film, flashes of Hannah are the only memories she experiences from the future as she’s learning the alien language. Perhaps she concluded she must go through something so singular and unmistakable as the loss of her child to make that leap of understanding.

A possible clue behind director Denis Villeneuve’s intent can be found in another of his films. In Blade Runner 2049, the protagonist Kay (Ryan Gosling) visits a scientist skilled in crafting false memory implants for artificial beings. When asked what makes her good at what she does, she says:

“They all think it’s about more detail. But that’s not how memory works. We recall with our feelings…”

If Denis is expressing a similar idea here, it would mean to begin experiencing ‘memories’ from the future, Louise would require a profoundly emotional event. Anything less simply wouldn’t register with her still developing abilities. For Louise, bringing Hannah into the world and subsequently losing her to an early death is a way of lighting an emotional beacon from the future to guide her past self in the understanding of the alien’s language.

But this rationalization doesn’t sit right with me. Going with the flow for these extrinsic reasons feels like what the Louise at the film’s start would have done. But her experiences, her connection to her colleague Ian, and what she’s seen has changed her. What path she follows now is a choice she is willing to “embrace”, not a duty she’s fulfilling. Instead of lamenting Hannah’s early death, she chooses to be grateful to have had something in her life she loves enough to miss when it’s gone. She concludes that Hannah brings so much joy and beauty into the world and into Louise’s heart, that even her unjustly short life is a full and worthwhile one.

The courage to make important choices or create something while embracing the worst possible outcomes is a powerful thing. Nothing is certain and everything is ephemeral. It’s easy to trick ourselves into thinking if we play it safe, we’ll be okay, so much that most spend their entire lives in avoidance of the only singular truth we really know; that we will someday die. In hiding from this painful truth, we close ourselves off from a greater appreciation of what time we do have. Making peace with the impermanent nature of our own lives gives us the perspective necessary to devoting one’s time to the only real form of immortality we can attain; the connections we make with one another, the effects of which radiate outward in the chorus of humanity for generations.

At the beginning of the film, Louise is shown to be withdrawn, lonely, and merely drifting through her life. It’s implied she is like this due to grief for her lost daughter. By the end, we learn that losing her daughter isn’t what broke her. The opposite is true.

Only after experiencing a love as profound as that for her daughter, a love that transcends even the deepest sorrows, is Louise willing to embrace life and all the ups and downs that come with choosing to actually live and share it with others. In doing so, she no longer fears her own death nor that of her daughter because she knows it isn’t really the end.

I wouldn’t miss that for the world.

Thanks for reading! If you’d like more science fiction overthinking, I wrote another short essay on Blade Runner 2049.