Nocturnal Animals

The first few minutes of this film was..... unusual....

It starts in a gallery, full of plus sized naked women models.  I turned to my friend and laughed, I'm not sure this is what I signed up for....

The actual story is about a woman, in a seemingly unhappy marriage, receiving a novel written by her ex husband.  The story is I guess symbolic of the feelings he's had all this time about their break up.

His story is about a family who get driven off the road in Texas, the guys in the other car then proceed to kidnap the wife & daughter and it ultimately ends in their rape and murders.  A year later, he returns to talk to the investigating officer on the case as they've arrested one of the suspects for another crime.  It turns into a bit of a revenge mission, with the husband demanding to understand how they felt when they were murdered, what exactly happened.  Turns out the detective has terminal cancer and wants to see this through, he's not worried about what happens to him as he's going to die anyway.

So, they track down the suspects, the husband identifies them.  Detective shoots one of them, and then we are left with the showdown between the main suspect and the husband.  There's a bit of a fight and the husband ends up shooting the suspect but also gaining a serious wound to the head.  So when he finally tries to stagger away, falls on his gun and shoots himself in the stomach.

In reality, she's read this book and contacted her ex husband and they arrange to meet. The film ends with her sitting in a restaurant apparently stood up.

Did her ex husband have cancer?  Had he died before meeting her, or did he stand her up on purpose? Did she regret choosing a materialist life over true love?  Why on earth was I subjected to the first few minutes of the film?

Arrival

Is time linear?  This film has been buzzing round my mind for ages.

The question this film raised is "If you could see the future, would you change it?" So, the main character Louise (Amy Adams) develops communication with Alien visitors known as Heptapods.  In return for help that they will need from us in 3000 years, they hand over a gift (or weapon as it is referred to throughout, which obviously makes Humans anxious).  That gift is that once you can understand the Heptapod language, you stop seeing time as linear, meaning all that has happened and will happening is happening right now.

Surely though, if everything that is going to happen to you is already happening, right now, as you read this, you can't change anything.  The decision has already been made, and the consequences of those decisions already happening.  How much does that affect the control we believe we have over our own destiny?

Are we just on a path, or can we change our future? Would a non-linear timeline equal multiverse theory?

My head hurts, this film was pretty good.