Contact

Saw the movie when I was little, which I loved. But! Turns out the movie left out the part where Sagan rips into rich assholes going to space to run away from the damage they did to Earth. The accurate critique of crapitalism was left out of a Hollywood movie, shocker.

When I saw the film I felt there was a lot left out. The film's narrative seemed disjointed and rushed. The book while it does fill in some of those glossed in details has its own pacing problems. After spending pages and pages explaining why something can't be done, this road block is suddenly gone. Then there's the ultimate "trip" to Vega is just as disappointing in the book (though certainly more coherent than the cinematic version).

This is a slow-burning and contemplative story about humanity’s first contact with extraterrestrial life. Sagan touches upon the intertwinement of philosophy, religion, science and politics as he considers the ramifications of such an historic event. It is a book about the big questions in life and the small questions. About God and family, about aliens and ants. It’s very profound. The first part of the book depicts Ellie’s early life, as she discovers the world and universe around her. It struck a chord with me, being a recent father. Carl Sagan had just gotten a daughter, Sasha, in 1983, two years before the publication of the novel. It seems likely that he based some of Ellie on her; while Sasha was just a toddler at the time, and not even conceived when Sagan first wrote Contact as a screenplay, I assume he gave a lot of thought to how she would grow up in a man’s world (especially if she would follow in his scientific footsteps), and based the final version of Ellie partly on his vision of how she might grow up. (Coincidentally, Ellie’s father and role model dies when she is in seventh grade, and Carl Sagan himself passed away in 1996, in Sasha’s 13th year.) Laurel Lefkow did a great job as audiobook narrator. Her voices and accents were pretty on point, although I didn’t much care for her lisping character(s?), and her Ethiopian and Indian accents were pretty similar. I have actually never watched the movie. I will immediately do so. The story reminded me a fair bit of Interstellar (one of my all-time favorite movies), which is of course fitting since both star Matthew McConaughey, and Kip S. Thorne acted as science advisor on both.

[Audiobook] 3.9 So good. Looking forward to the movie.

I’m torn. The writing isn’t bad, but the plotting is off. There is a surprising lack of suspense and a strange matter-of-fact way of introducing scenes that could have been more interesting, if they had just been presented differently. When a previous scene does build some tension or curiosity it is almost always diffused in the first few sentences of the next chapter. It’s quite strange. Contact remains one of my favourite movie and I respect the adaptation even more now. The movie gets at the heart of the story better. But I also really enjoyed the opportunity to get inside the characters’ heads, too. In terms of interesting questions and musings, I think the book has it. In terms of good plotting and getting at The question this book strives to articulate, the movie has it.

Une excellente lecture.

Nie była tym, czym spodziewałem się, że będzie.

Damn....this was magnificent. That is all.

Having re-watched the movie many times, I thought it was finally time to give the book a shot. It matches up surprisingly well with the movie, with smart cuts from the book - I was actually impressed by that. The book goes more into Elles family life, which has a different dynamic than the movie. The part I enjoyed the most in the book were the discussions between Elle and religious leaders. The book went much more into these discussions than in the book. Probably my favorite quotes from the book was by Elle when discussing world overpopulation: "A celibate clergy is an especially good idea, because it tends to suppress any hereditary propensity toward fanaticism." Overall some definite differences between the book and the movie, but not so much that you're going to be surprised by what's happening.

I felt that every phrase of this book carried a special meaning to me. I'll sure be rereading it many times.

One of my favorite book + movie combinations.