Sagan's "Contact"

[Amazing Rando]

This is a question to anyone who has ever read Carl Sagan's novel Contact or seen the movie.

I just saw the movie "Contact", and I really enjoyed it. Anybody else seen it? I'm curious- how closely does it follow the book? I ask this because I found the movie's conclusion to be very un-Saganlike. In the movie, when Dr. Arroway returns from her voyage, she's bombarded with skeptics' questions and demands that she provide "proof" of her experiences. This is very ironic, because throughout the whole movie, she'd been doing the very same thing to her Christian lover- demanding "proof" of God's existance.

This turning of the tables seemed to be very contrary to what Carl Sagan would have written. to anybody who has read the book- was this part included in the book? Or was this an example of Robert Zemeckis (the director) changing Sagan's story to provide a more "faith positive" message? I was thinking about this because of the obvious way Spielberg changed Stanley Kubrick's vision in the movie "AI: Artificial Intelligence."

[geebob]

I thought it was pretty interesting and ejoyable. The depiction of the religious fanatics though irritated me.

[Da Lone-Warrior]

As I understand it, the movie seems to accept the legitimacy of faith and express a desire for religion to be something that would unite rather than divide us or spawn hate.

And, of course, it disavows Christian sexual ethics. I s'pose this reflects an excessive "faith" in individuals ability to choose whether or not to sleep with someone because they are "in love".

dlw

[kafka]

....two and a half hours and the alien turns out to be her dad... :hrm:

not a fan of most of the cast anyway...

[Amazing Rando]

Today @ 03:56 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=332077#post332077)
Love-Warrior:

As I understand it, the movie seems to accept the legitimacy of faith and express a desire for religion to be something that would unite rather than divide us or spawn hate.

And, of course, it disavows Christian sexual ethics. I s'pose this reflects an excessive "faith" in individuals ability to choose whether or not to sleep with someone because they are "in love".

dlw

That's how I saw it too. Sagan on the other hand, as far I as know, did not accept the legitimacy of faith. That's why I was wondering if the movie's ending had been significantly changed. I bet it was, but I haven't read the book. Anyone read it?

[The Laughing Man]

I read the book a looooooooooooong time ago (I adamantly refuse to say how long :wink: ) and from what I remember, I think the movie digressed from the book. I can't say how much, though.

[Amazing Rando]

That's cool Jinx! Was this before you became a Christian, or after?

The end of the film seems totally un-Saganlike! Oh well, I guess I just need to go pick up a copy of the book to see for myself if Robert Zemeckis pulled a fast one on poor old dead carl Sagan!

[The Laughing Man]

I'm actually not sure of when I read it anymore. :nsm: Not recently.

[Solly]

On a side note, his series Cosmos, or more specifically, the soundtrack, really boosted my interest in classical music, following on from the Star Wars soundtrack. I used to have bill-yuns and bill-yuns of records. *sorry, had to get that in.*

[Socrates]

Yesterday @ 01:19 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=330687#post330687)
Amazing Rando:

This is a question to anyone who has ever read Carl Sagan's novel Contact or seen the movie.
Yes, unfortunately, as anti-Christian as we would expect from a lifelong atheistic bigot like Sagan (who now knows there is a God :flaming:) — see A few comments concerning the passing of Carl Sagan (www.answersingenesis.org/docs/2164.asp) and The Sagan of Science (http://trinityfoundation.org/reviews/journal.asp?ID=068b.html).


I just saw the movie Contact, and I really enjoyed it. Anybody else seen it? I'm curious — how closely does it follow the book? I ask this because I found the movie's conclusion to be very un-Saganlike. In the movie, when Dr. Arroway returns from her voyage, she's bombarded with skeptics' questions and demands that she provide "proof" of her experiences. This is very ironic, because throughout the whole movie, she'd been doing the very same thing to her Christian lover — demanding “proof” of God's existance.

Of course this “Christian” lover is ultra liberal theologically and a fornicator. And the heroine was portrayed as stumping a church leader with the boring old Cain's Wife canard, long ago answered by creationists, e.g. www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/tools/cains_wife.asp

[Xavier]

Correct if I'm wrong, but didn't the Book end with an entire chapter conserning the "Artist's Signature"....

Also, on an earlier comment, there was EXTREME diversion from the plot of the book to the movie. In the book, 5 people go and all come back with absolutely no evidence.

I'll go dig the book out of the library later today and double check a couple of things.

Yours,
Xavier

:xav:

[Amazing Rando]

Today @ 01:12 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=332881#post332881)
Socrates:

Yes, unfortunately, as anti-Christian as we would expect from a lifelong atheistic bigot like Sagan (who now knows there is a God :flaming:) — see A few comments concerning the passing of Carl Sagan (www.answersingenesis.org/docs/2164.asp) and The Sagan of Science (http://trinityfoundation.org/reviews/journal.asp?ID=068b.html).

Of course this “Christian” lover is ultra liberal theologically and a fornicator. And the heroine was portrayed as stumping a church leader with the boring old Cain's Wife canard, long ago answered by creationists, e.g. www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/tools/cains_wife.asp

I found a link with some helpful info-

http://www.unomaha.edu/~wwwjrf/paradiso.htm


[7] Although both the film and the novel relate essentially the same basic story line, they differ in several key ways. For my purposes, the most significant of these differences is that Ellie’s love interest in the novel, the scientist Ken der Heer, and the independent minded religious thinker, Palmer Joss, are in the film collapsed into a single character. In the film, Palmer Joss is both the religious thinker and Ellie’s lover.

[8] Another important change is that in the film Ellie journeys to Vega alone, not in the company of four other astronauts. This focuses the attention more clearly on Ellie’s own psychological, religious, and social difficulties, particularly those she encounters when few believe that she actually made a trip at all. In the film, she has no community of fellow pilgrims to affirm her beliefs and to offer emotional support; Palmer Joss must do this instead.

So Zemeckis took two characters from Sagan's book and compressed them into one- Palmer Joss. It was a pretty unwise thing to do, but maybe it was nessesary to avoid to much plot complexity. Those of you who've read the book, how does Sagan portray Palmer?

As Xavier noted, Ellie's travelling companions were written out of the movie as well. This is a significant difference because when she gets back from her voyage in Zemeckis's film, she doesn't have anybody to affirm the trip actually took place- this leaves her worse off than Sagan did I suppose.

So do you guys think Zemeckis pulled a fast one on ol' dead Carl Sagan?

[Trout]

For someone who's life defining saying was," the universe is all there ever was or ever will be" It seemed the author of the screenplay was in desperate search of meaning beyond the physical realm.

[Amazing Rando]

Exactly! That's why I was pretty sure the film was quite the departure from the book- both in tone and in substance.