10 Times Movies Did Their Research (And Nailed It)

Looking at the above picture, you may be wondering exactly how much scientific research was necessary for a film that appears to star gigantic versions of Half-Life's head-crabs who communicate through holographic calligraphy. As it turns out, that form of communication was one of the most praised elements of Arrival in the scientific community.

In a conversation with WIRED, Jessica Coon - an Associate Professor in the Department of Linguistics at McGill University and a consultant on the film - said that the movie's depiction of translating an alien language was as realistic as it could be. In the movie Amy Adams' scientist character mimics simple words to the aliens, who in turn draw pictures (called logograms), which Adams has to interpret the patterns of. It's a slow, painstaking process which - as anyone who's ever tried learning a language will tell you - is par for the course.

The movie also invokes an extreme version of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, which dictates that language affects our view of the world, as Adams' character is able to see through time as a result of her eventual fluency in the aliens' language. Naturally, that's a somewhat extreme example of the hypothesis, but it is true that learning another culture's language can generate greater empathy.