"Contact" starts slowly, with mundane every-day life drama, and escalates into a sci-fi epic under the considerable directive talents of Robert Zemeckis, Academy Award winning director of "Forrest Gump."
Jodie Foster stars as Ellie Arroway, a scientist dedicated to searching for signs of alien life. The first forty-five minutes or so of the movie deal solely with her battle with her superior, David Drumlin (Tom Skerrit). The two struggle over funding, lab space and antenna-time for listening for radio broadcasts by extra-terrestrial life.
The drama in the first half of the movie is well done, if somewhat disjointed from the rest of the film. Skerrit plays his slimy character convincingly enough that viewers will wish they could stand up and punch him.
Foster plays her role with her usual level of skill, which is to say second to none.
Nonetheless, the first half of the film drips with sentiment, and unless viewers are over the age of seventy, they will most likely find it maudlin and gratuitous.
Matthew McConaughey plays Arroway's love interest, Palmer Joss, who happens to be the spiritual guru of the free world. David Morse plays young Arroway's father, who died when she was nine.
His death scene is the most base attempt at eliciting the sympathy of the viewer, and, depending on your mood, your eyes will either be rolling or misting over with tears.
"Contact" picks up its pace, however, when Arroway and her team discover a pulse of strings of prime numbers in a radio message coming from the star Vega, 26 light years away. The decoded message includes plans which could be used to build a spaceship.
Arroway then finds herself embroiled in political, religious and academic controversy. James Woods enters at this point, as National Security Advisor Michael Kitz.
Woods plays the despicable, power-tripping politician and is even more loathsome than Skerrit's character. While Woods gives a good character performance, one hopes that he isn't being type cast as the unbelievable nasty bad guy who gets what he deserves in the end.
His past performances have been varied and compelling, in films such as 1989's "True Believer." Of late, he has consistently played the villain, and this film is no exception.
John Hurt gives a wonderfully creepy performance as S. R. Hadden, a half-mad billionaire who appears mysteriously to Ellie to help her when she is stuck translating the code broadcast to Earth by the aliens.
Sporadically throughout the movie, Hurt's character appears, dispensing advice to Ellie like a schizophrenic Yoda. While these scenes are slightly grandiose, Hurt's performance makes them believable and atmospheric.
Perhaps the best thing about "Contact" is the fact that it deals with all of the social aspects of its presented scenario. All too often, science fiction literature and cinema fail to portray convincingly the popular reaction to a momentous event, in this case the discovery of extra-terrestrial intelligence.
The film examines both religious conservatism and radicalism through a sense of humor mixed with a healthy shot of horror. "Contact" will make viewers muse upon the despicable and irrational actions people sometimes take in the name of God.
Joss comes into the film when Arroway discovers the signal from Vega and acts as the voice of spiritual moderation, rationally contemplating the spiritual ramifications of Ellie's discovery.
Rob Lowe makes a hilarious surprise cameo as Richard Rank, spokesman for the religious right and perhaps a none-to-subtle poke at religious conservatism.
All in all, "Contact" is a gripping movie, and in spite of being too long, won't have viewers bored throughout its entire two and a half hours.
