Before they first entered the alien spacecraft, there were several shots toggles. From the hand touch the shell of the ship, to the character’s face close-up, to the hand close-up, and then back to the face close-up. Can not help but guess who this hand is, male or female.
Although men and women are divided about what constitutes the foundation of civilization, when we encounter a new thing, our instinctive reactions are the same. We are both afraid and curious. We both want to go near it and because we want to keep safe. distance. The people, the soldiers, and the stock market all show our fear of the unknown. For the first time into the spacecraft, the only light source is high above, a closed dark environment, solemn and mysterious background music, and a rising channel. And all the preparations that human had made before were merely in exchange for the obscure figures of two aliens.
When the alien language first appeared, the feeling was three-dimensional and dynamic. There are several close-ups in the movie. And when their language is translated into a flat 2D image that we can understand, hasn’t it been changed? The heroine’s understanding of alien language and alien language is gradual. Even at the end of the film, I’m not quite sure whether she fully understood and mastered such a language. From weapons, to tools, to gifts. The three words that seem to translate to each other express a completely different willingness. Weapons are understood as malicious, tools are neutral, and gifts express the goodwill of aliens. What aliens give is a tool. As for whether the tool is a science and technology or a process or a method, it is not very important. It is only the heroine’s understanding of this matter. Nuclear energy is a tool, a science and technology, it can also be a weapon, it can also be a gift. Just like our future, how it is depends on how we look at it and on how we choose to look at it.
The film mentions once the Sapir Whorf hypothesis which basically just says that language shapes the way we perceive reality. So Quantum physics (which i definitely do not understand) tells us that all points of reality are equally existent at any given “time”. So basically time is just a social construct. The idea that human ability to perceive reality one event at a time has forced all earthly language (and therefore perceptions of reality) to be bound by a linear timeline. The heptopod language is not linear at all it has no direction of reality. This is also (in true movie fashion) heavily implied by the circular shape.
So now with this, perhaps at the end of the film, the Sapir Whorf hypothesis is coming to truth. As Louise learned the heptopods language and became further immersed, the language began to influence the way she literally was perceiving reality. Her thoughts (visions sorta?) that showed points in reality in the past present and future regardless of the “now” may have been her new language offering her the mechanisms with which to make sense of reality, as Sapir Whorf proposes.