STRATEGIES OF FILM MINIMALISM AND THE TRANSCENDENТAL IN THE SCIENCE FICTION FILM ARRIVAL BY DENIS VILLENEUVE

Text topic: Minimalism

Text author: Весна Перић

Science fiction as a film genre often employs strategies of minimalism – through elements such as narrative structure, shots, camera angles, camera movement, composition, lighting, colour, costume, set design and sound narration. The minimalistic technique manifests transcendental style – the way Paul Schrader uses this term in his study Transcendental Style in Film: Ozu, Bresson, Dreyer (although it doesn’t cover this genre). This technique involves the principle of reduction in all possible forms, as well as repetition, abandoning decorative details and expressive techniques, conveying the film narrative to a stasis – a point where sparse means collide. Ontological query posed by SF dramas such as Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, Tarkovsky’s Solaris, Danny Boyle’s Sunshine, Alfonso Cuarón’s Gravity, where suspense derives from human contact with the Universe and from transcendence of earthly existence, also frames the film narrative Arrival directed by a Canadian filmmaker Denis Villeneuve. Consistently executing minimalistic strategies, Villeneuve guides his female protagonist through contact with extra-terrestrial beings into the sphere of transcendental experience. This paper interprets those strategies in a film medium which follow minimalistic practices of painters and visual artists (Frank Stella, Barnett Newman, Mark Rothko and similar) as well as techniques of music minimalism through sound design and original soundtrack. The protagonist’s contact with heptapods (extra-terrestrials with seven limbs) not only results in deciphering their written language but in her own epiphany: going through transcendental experience she is given a gift of foreseeing her future and making life changing decisions.