“Arrival”, released in 2016, starring Amy Adams and Jeremy Renner, is probably one of the greatest alien films of the 21st century. Denis Villeneuve’s masterpiece is a totally new take on an alien invasion, imagining what could happen if we actually tried to communicate peacefully with aliens instead of immediately going on the defensive. In addition to the film’s thematic elements, it also has an influence on how it portrays the aforementioned aliens – there’s the sleek, oblong shape of their spacecraft and the starfish-like legs of the intelligent aliens themselves. same.
The influence of “Arrival” on “Nope” is most evident in the construction of the alien creature in the film. While it initially appears as a smooth, saucer-like vessel like the starships in “Arrival”, OJ and Emerald quickly realize that it is not a vessel at all, but a carnivorous creature. When the creature’s internal form is revealed, it is reminiscent of the squid-like aliens humans encounter in “Arrival”.
OJ’s attempts to communicate with the creature also mirror in some ways the central struggle of “Arrival,” though the stakes are quite different. While the aliens in “Arrival” prove to be extremely intelligent and advanced, Jean Jacket seems to care only about satiating her appetite. Nonetheless, OJ invokes his substantial knowledge of animal training to communicate with Jean Jacket as if it were one of his horses, hinting at the same questions about how aliens might behave if they descended to earth.
