One hell of a movie. The fourth best science fiction movie ever made if you ask me after the Matrix, Waterworld and Total recall.
Jodie Foster is a scientist who discovers some radio signals from outer space and discovers that they are the blueprints for making a device that can travel at the speed of light and into Outer Space. Accordingly she brings her work to the notice of the world. The entire world plans to collect money and makes the device. The U.S by virtue of being the greatest donor gets to send an American scientist other than Foster(who is annoyed at being left out) in the device. It sends a scientist but before it can leave it is destroyed by a suicide bomber from some odd cult.
However The U.S secretly builds another one and sends Foster. Foster returns in about 18 seconds but in her head she feels that she had travelled for 20 hours or so. She seriously believes that she has been transported into an alien world. She also has illusions about speaking to her dad. It is as if she is in heaven. She does not know what is going on around her. But reports show that the device never left Earth. Foster counters that since it was at the speed of light no one must have noticed.
A grand jury is set up which finally establishes the fact that S.R Haddon a prominent scientist cum multi-millionaire who was about to die of Cancer and does towards the end had used the number of satellites to make believe that the signals were coming from outer space whereas actually he was sending them to earth by reflecting them from a planet of a very further star. He used mathematics for his messages which is the language of the universe.
Before dying Haddon a rebellious person had played the most expensive joke on mankind. This is a must see film.
What makes it a class apart from the three movies ahead of it is the brainy stuff. There is debate. there is talk, there is intellegent stuff. The director or the writer respects the audiences and their ability to think about the movie by not providing some of the answers and letting the people interpret things in their own way. Great movie. It comes once in a while on HBO. Don’t miss it the next time. As for me I watch it every time it comes so that I can understand more of the stuff.
Foster is brilliant. her glamour is underplayed in the movie but she is brilliant as always.