Contact

Contact hat mir vom ersten Moment an sehr gut gefallen und mich bis zum Schluss nicht mehr losgelassen. Allein der Name Carl Sagan als Autor des Romans ist eine Garantie dafür, dass der Film eine tiefgründige Meditation über Wissenschaft, Glaube, Wahrheit und Wissen sein wird und keine schockierende Darstellung des ersten Kontakts mit grünen Männchen (oder anderen Merkwürdigkeiten)... Und überraschenderweise nimmt der Film all die ausdrucksstarken Parabeln und Ideen ohne große Schwierigkeiten auf, auch wenn deren weitreichender und expliziter Ausdruck manchmal an der Grenze zum Kitsch schwankt. Nichtsdestotrotz ist die Suche des sympathischen Wissenschaftlers nach dem "ersten Kontakt" (vielmehr jedoch nach dem Wesen des Wissens) spannend und gut gefilmt. Es ist nur schade, dass Zemeckis nicht in der Lage war, Kubricks Epos 2001: Odyssee im Weltraum in Bezug auf die visuellen Aspekte nachzuahmen... Aber das ist zu viel verlangt... (30.03.2004)

A smartly written story that seems so believable that it could easily happen tomorrow. It perfectly fulfils the meaning of the term SCIENCE-fiction. I've read the book by Carl Sagan, but the movie is even better, strange as that it might sound. BTW, Johny_MH, you are wrong. Contact was not a flop, it made over 100 million in the US, here it fizzled out without much interest. I guess it’s because audiences are not very interested in sci-fi unless there’s cosmic crap and laser beams. I saw it in the cinema on a wide screen and it was my greatest cinematic experience of the year. (17.07.2002)

A pleasant sci-fi film that managed to arouse in me an acute and impatient curiosity to know what would happen next, what kind of truths about alien civilisations would be revealed (this is something that the mythology episodes of X-Files manage to do regularly). Pity that weird and long ending. (23.06.2011)

Contact is certainly not as shallowly appealing as the famous Zemeckis Back to the Future trilogy, but in the director's filmography and the genre of sci-fi films, it occupies an even more important place. Zemeckis proved that it was possible to make an audience-friendly sci-fi film without cheap genre props and action scenes. Zemeckis is constantly involved in the field of scientific theories and his world vision of contact with extraterrestrial civilization has a realistic basis. The driving forces of the film are dramatic, well-written dialogues, convincingly portrayed character psychology, impressive plot twists, and clever film ideas. The film is very well cast and also well-acted. The budget is adequate for the demanding artistic vision, and Zemeckis luckily had a reputation from previous successful films and was able to impress the producers. Overall impression: 80%. (20.06.2006)

Zemeckis' underrated exploration of space, politics, and most importantly, interpersonal relationships, is something I appreciate more and more each day. From a pleasant and fulfilling experience, it escalated into a film that projects itself into various life situations, dangerously frequently. In my eyes, this is Jodie Foster's life role and probably the centerpiece of Zemeckis' journey towards spiritual rebirth (initiated by Jenny in Forrest Gump and concluded by Cast Away's Chuck). That journey was terribly long and yet completely simple. (03.06.2008)