The Best Movies You’ve Never Seen podcast – Contact

[00:01:43] Stephen Fenech: The best movies you've never seen. Hello and welcome to our movie podcast. My name is Steven Fenech, and the idea behind this podcast is that I choose the movies and I show them to my co-host Trevor Long, who, as the title suggests, has never seen them before.

[00:01:58] Trevor Long: That's it.

[00:01:59] Stephen Fenech: And, uh, that is our show. And this week is probably case in point. You've not seen this film, uh, released in 1997, Contact.

[00:02:07] Trevor Long: Nope.

[00:02:08] Stephen Fenech: Starring Jodie Foster and Matthew McConaughey, uh, directed by Robert Zemeckis. Do you know the big movie that Robert Zemeckis directed, mate?

[00:02:14] Trevor Long: Back to the Future.

[00:02:15] Stephen Fenech: Back to the Future. Hey, look at the big brain on Trevor!

[00:02:18] Trevor Long: Yeah, let's go!

[00:02:19] Stephen Fenech: All right, this is based on the Carl Sagan novel which was published in 1985. Now this, I think thematically, this is an interesting film because it's kind of a three-sided argument, right? There's science there's faith and there's politics all mixed into one.

[00:02:38] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:02:39] Stephen Fenech: As we talk about the film, you'll understand all the who's coming from where.

[00:02:43] Trevor Long: I'm glad you said that earlier because it's basically the thing I took out of it.

[00:02:46] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, mixture. Yeah, yeah. Now, production was halted, uh, when Francis Ford Coppola, the famed director of The Godfather and many other great films, filed a breach of contract suit against Carl Sagan's estate and Warner Brothers. He claimed that he had developed Contact, the Contact premise for Zoetrobe Studios. That's his studio. Obviously nothing came of it because they finished the movie and released it. Yeah, but there was a little road, a little speed hump there at the time, little bump in the road, right? Uh, sadly, the author Carl Sagan, who was also a producer, died during production.

[00:03:26] Trevor Long: Oh wow.

[00:03:26] Stephen Fenech: And he was apparently, uh, supposed to have a, a cameo in the film, but his role as a producer was to ensure that the science was accurately depicted.

[00:03:39] Trevor Long: Okay, right.

[00:03:40] Stephen Fenech: So he was like an advisor, producer, but sadly he had a cameo planned, but they didn't— he passed away.

[00:03:46] Trevor Long: Wow.

[00:03:46] Stephen Fenech: Now, had you— I don't think you'd heard of this until I told you about this a couple of weeks ago. So what, what are your— what were your impressions before your first viewing? What were you expecting?

[00:03:57] Trevor Long: I think you'd given me that it was— it involved space and, uh, and such.

[00:04:01] Stephen Fenech: So astronomy.

[00:04:02] Trevor Long: I guess I was a little nervous because space makes me think sci-fi.

[00:04:07] Stephen Fenech: So not always, as you discovered. Yeah, correct.

[00:04:10] Trevor Long: So, uh, there was, there was trepidation coming in. But yeah, certainly I had no knowledge or perceptions of this movie.

[00:04:16] Stephen Fenech: It did, uh, receive one Oscar nomination, Best Sound nomination. For Best Sound, yeah, was beaten by this little battler of a movie called Titanic.

[00:04:27] Trevor Long: Ah, I mean, they tried hard. They did well for the budget they had.

[00:04:30] Stephen Fenech: They did all right. Uh, our man Roger Ebert 3.5 out of 4 stars.

[00:04:36] Trevor Long: He goes— I still can't believe he goes out of 4, but anyway.

[00:04:38] Stephen Fenech: So the, the later— the last part of his review is this: What happens in the last third of the film I will not describe. Some of it you can guess. You may be guessing wrong. In a later article, I'll speculate about what happens and whether it happens the way it seems to. Zemeckis uses special effects to suggest the climactic events without upstaging them. Earlier effects, however, that seemingly incorporate President Clinton into the film are simply distracting. Movies like Contact help explain why movies like Independence Day leave me feeling empty and unsatisfied.

[00:05:13] Trevor Long: Interesting.

[00:05:14] Stephen Fenech: When I look up at the sky through a telescope, when I follow the landing of the research vehicle on Mars, when I read about cosmology, I brush against transcendence. The universe is so large and old and beautiful, and our life as an intelligent species is so brief, and that our knowledge is like a tiny hint surrounded by a void. Has another race been around longer and learned more? Where are they. We've been listening for only a few decades. Space and time are so vast, a signal's chances of reaching us at the right time and place are so remote they make a message in a bottle look reliable. But if one came, dot dot dot. Ah, Rog. Roger.

[00:05:56] Trevor Long: Roger's deeper than I could ever imagine.

[00:05:58] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, yeah, wow, absolutely. But very learned man, that is. Uh, there's a lot to— there's a lot to unpack from this movie, but, uh, and we will be doing it. If this, uh, this is your last exit before the freeway, We're going to take a deep dive into Contact. If you haven't seen it, you can watch it through Fetch.

[00:06:13] Trevor Long: That's right. And Fetch is your all-in-one entertainment service to ensure that you're getting great value entertainment, more content in one place, smarter and easier access to all those things. From as little as $3.99 a month, you get access to free-to-air TV, 25 included channels, streaming apps, the movie box, the movie store, games, universal voice search, a smart TV guide that is unbelievable, forward and backwards EPG, and access to your Fetch on a mobile and tablet. App. It is a movie lover's dream with 11,000+ movies available to rent or buy, another 800+ TV shows, and of course, uh, the premium channels and all the content you would normally expect from your streaming apps too, because it's got all your favorite streaming apps. So you can find out more and get your hands on Fetch at fetchtv.com.au.

[00:07:00] Stephen Fenech: Alrighty, now you have seen Contact. Love to hear your first impressions. Uh, was it what you thought it was going to be? Surprises?

[00:07:09] Trevor Long: Wasn't at all what I thought. It was much more, I guess, based in reality than I worried. So that was a big win.

[00:07:18] Stephen Fenech: Were you seriously expecting like aliens?

[00:07:20] Trevor Long: Yeah, I mean, it's called Contact and there's, you know, there's, you just like independent. It's interesting the way Roger Ebert described that Independence Day thing. It's like, okay, they come and then what? Turn up, you know? So this is a bit different. That was what I was worried about. So it didn't have that, which was pleasing. So, and you know, what was it at?

[00:07:38] Stephen Fenech: 2:25? 2:25, yeah, long.

[00:07:40] Trevor Long: It was long, but You know, didn't, didn't drag. So I feel like it kept you going pretty well. Would I chop some? Maybe.

[00:07:48] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, well, I'll ask you that question later. But, uh, what is your social media post?

[00:07:52] Trevor Long: Uh, this time it's a movie about deep space that's not sci-fi. That's okay with me. While Contact does push into a zone of fantasy, you can see how it's built on reality, and that's a fascinating way to challenge your mind. Plus there's a theological debate within that would challenge many. With a cast like Contact, it's well worth a look.

[00:08:11] Stephen Fenech: Well, I actually saw this at the movies in a special preview. Hey, yeah, I was working.

[00:08:17] Trevor Long: You'd become you by then.

[00:08:18] Stephen Fenech: I was, uh, I was always me, but, uh, it was— I, I had, uh, I think my desk was not far from the feature section who often had, oh, who wants a double pass to see this? I'm like, no, I'll take that. Uh, but here's the thing, I can remember the— I remember watching it, the preview, and then the actual release of it in cinemas was pushed back a few weeks.

[00:08:39] Trevor Long: Oh really?

[00:08:40] Stephen Fenech: Because Men in Black had just come out and the distributors, Warner Brothers, were worried that Men in Black was going to eat up a lot of the box office. They thought, why don't we wait, we'll put ours back a few weeks.

[00:08:51] Trevor Long: That's fair.

[00:08:51] Stephen Fenech: So they, they didn't want to compete directly with it because they're both released in 1997.

[00:08:55] Trevor Long: I mean, you've got to be cautious of that stuff in the movie game, don't you?

[00:08:58] Stephen Fenech: Absolutely. Okay, let's look at the cast. Jodie Foster plays Ellie Arroway, and she was in Taxi Driver as a young, very young kid. Silence of the Lambs, of course, Oscar-winning performance there. Flight Plan, which we've done as well. We've done Silence of the Lambs, we've done Flight Plan. Matthew McConaughey plays Palmer Jost. Now this is earlier in his career. He'd just done A Time to Kill. He'd done A Time to Kill, which is based on the John Grisham novel, and that really put him on the map. He's also done Interstellar, which we've done.

[00:09:30] Trevor Long: Yep.

[00:09:31] Stephen Fenech: And Dallas Buyers Club, for which he won an Oscar. Lost a ton of weight. Yeah, that was also quite on the list.

[00:09:38] Trevor Long: Wasn't that in the heavily torrential— heavily, yeah, that was with all the piracy case.

[00:09:42] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, back in 2014, I think it was somewhere there. Yeah, '13. Uh, Tom Skerritt, did you recognize him? He plays David Drumlin. Did you recognize what movie he was out of?

[00:09:52] Trevor Long: Tell me, you're a fan, mate.

[00:09:54] Stephen Fenech: I don't know, it involves Air Force planes.

[00:09:56] Trevor Long: Give me a bunch of names.

[00:09:57] Stephen Fenech: So Tom Skerritt, that doesn't mean anything, but he played the guy, the Drumlin dude, who was the one sort of opposing Jodie Foster.

[00:10:03] Trevor Long: Oh yeah, of course. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've seen him in a heap of things, Top Gun including. Top Gun. He— I think he's done a lot of TV too.

[00:10:11] Stephen Fenech: He has. Uh, he was in Alien, the original Alien movie too, uh, with John Hurt, who's actually on the part of the movie, right? Uh, he was in the original M*A*S*H as well. M*A*S*H movie. Did you know that M*A*S*H was a movie before it's a TV show?

[00:10:25] Trevor Long: I did not know that.

[00:10:25] Stephen Fenech: You did not know that? Listen, every day is a school day. I have seen that movie. I have watched the movie.

[00:10:31] Trevor Long: Weirdo.

[00:10:31] Stephen Fenech: I haven't watched the TV. I've watched the movie though, and Tom Skerritt is part of that. Donald Sutherland.

[00:10:36] Trevor Long: It's a pretty big cast.

[00:10:37] Stephen Fenech: Okay, right. But there's also John Hurt who plays the— I forget his name now— the billionaire. Angela Bassett, James Woods, David Morse plays her dad, Ellie's dad.

[00:10:50] Trevor Long: Oh yeah.

[00:10:51] Stephen Fenech: And William Fichtner who plays the blind guy.

[00:10:53] Trevor Long: Ellie's dad I recognized too.

[00:10:54] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, William Fichtner was in last week's movie Strange Days. Okay, he's doubling down. Vincent D'Onofrio, him and him were the cops. Um, so, uh, that, that's a pretty stellar cast.

[00:11:07] Trevor Long: Very much so.

[00:11:08] Stephen Fenech: Before we hop into the top scenes, let's have a chat about Hisense. And Hisense have their brand new RGB Mini LED TVs on the market. Now these are, these are pretty impressive TVs, available in a range of sizes by the way too, so don't think you're going to be, uh, only restricted to small sizes. Now these mini RGB Mini LED TVs introduce a whole new technology It is based on the backlight, has, has the red, green, and blue cells that actually not only creating the brightness but also creating the color. And red, green, and blue are the building blocks of all colors, and they are able to have this really pure and, and really, really accurate color that they portray on their amazing screens. So right from the get-go, you're getting an improvement in the, in the overall picture quality, and you're seeing all these movies that we, that we talk about on the show are just going to absolutely pop on that Hisense screen. Now on the audio side, there's also straight out of the box you're getting 4.1.2 surround sound straight out of the box. So not only looking good but also sounding good as well. And if you're into your sport, if you're into your games, plenty of features there to absolutely optimize that experience for you as well. So if you want to watch all these movies that we talk about on the show, watch them on a Hisense TV. Check them out at your local store or head over to hisense.com.au. Now, a very interesting start to the film here. There is a what I call the cosmic zoom out. Did you see this, where it opens with this unbroken sort of pullback starting from Earth and the camera sort of goes through the solar system, past nebulae, out of the Milky Way? And the soundtrack has a reverse chronology, and here's what it sounds like. Get a bit quieter now. So did you get a sense that you're going from modern music to older music? Wasn't making So I've actually, my interjections are called Stardust. The Stardust I'm gonna sprinkle in.

[00:14:36] Trevor Long: Yes. Sprinkle it in.

[00:14:37] Stephen Fenech: The various television and radio transmissions. So they're both songs and transmissions like news items. Started off from 1997, which is when the movie was released. Like Spice Girls were in there. Then you go through to 1985, Funkytown, 1979, R2-D2 whistling and beeping from, that was in that, 1977. Going back, Richard Nixon, I'm not a crook, Robert Kennedy, shot in the hotel, 1968. So we're going backwards. John F. Kennedy shot in Dallas. Theme from The Twilight Zone, uh, Have You Ever Been a Member of the Communist Party? So we're in the 1950s. Yeah, all the way through to Over the Rainbow, and then finally Adolf Hitler.

[00:15:16] Trevor Long: So you're getting a sense of how the, the, the audio or the transmission of, of content is out there, and you're following it outwards from that number of years it would take.

[00:15:26] Stephen Fenech: So the camera pulls back all the way, and while we're listening to this, and then reveal— it reveals you're looking through the eye of Young Ellie Araway. So they did a really nice job there. Now, uh, in Wisconsin, young Ellie is guided by her dad Ted as she experiments.

[00:15:43] Trevor Long: It's a very— it's a love. You can immediately get how close and lovely this relationship is.

[00:15:48] Stephen Fenech: And she loves the ham radio.

[00:15:51] Movie Audio: CQ, CQ, this is W9GFO here. Come back. CQ, CQ, this is W9GFO. Is anybody out there? I'm not getting anything.

[00:16:09] Movie Audio: Small moves, Ellie. Small moves.

[00:16:16] Movie Audio: CQ, this is W9GFO here. Come back.

[00:16:20] Movie Audio: Copy, W9GFO.

[00:16:22] Stephen Fenech: K4WLD here.

[00:16:25] Movie Audio: What do I say?

[00:16:26] Stephen Fenech: Just be yourself.

[00:16:28] Movie Audio: Where are you, K4WLD? Come back.

[00:16:31] Trevor Long: Pensacola, over.

[00:16:32] Movie Audio: Pensacola? Where's Pensacola?

[00:16:34] Movie Audio: I'll give you a hint. Orange juice.

[00:16:41] Movie Audio: Copy that, K4WLD. How's the weather down there in Florida?

[00:16:45] Movie Audio: Pensacola, Florida. I have to tell you, Sparks, 1,116 miles. Pretty good.

[00:16:56] Trevor Long: That's farthest yet.

[00:16:58] Stephen Fenech: So that's pretty cool. She had an appreciation for, you know, listening out, reaching out. Yeah, this was kind of her internet back then. Hey, so yeah, I mean, the idea of—

[00:17:07] Trevor Long: and it certainly wasn't a widespread mainstream thing, but the idea of ham radio was you could just sit and theoretically randomly find anyone at any—

[00:17:15] Stephen Fenech: you were ham radio guy?

[00:17:16] Trevor Long: No, I knew someone who was though. I remember them having one.

[00:17:19] Stephen Fenech: And why is it called ham radio?

[00:17:20] Trevor Long: It stands for something. Okay, yeah, but normally what you put on a sandwich, it could be something like high frequency amplitude modulation.

[00:17:27] Stephen Fenech: Okay, every day is a school day.

[00:17:29] Trevor Long: Let me look that up now.

[00:17:30] Stephen Fenech: Sadly, after this scene, her father suffers a fatal heart attack. She runs for his medicine, but she's too late, right? And I found this interesting too, at the funeral she rejects all the people around her and turns to the radio go instead. Remember, she was trying to contact Dad, come back upstairs. Yeah, that was really sad. Uh, fast forward years later, and, uh, Dr. Ellie Arroway is a passionate SETI scientist, which is short for Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence.

[00:18:03] Trevor Long: I had SETI on my computer back in the late '90s. You could download it on your computer and it was, uh, you'd get, you know, a megabyte of data and your computer would analyze Does it?

[00:18:13] Stephen Fenech: Unbelievable. So this could have been you.

[00:18:15] Trevor Long: Could have been me. Wow.

[00:18:17] Stephen Fenech: Uh, she's working at the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. She's listening to space while her colleagues sort of a bit mocking her pursuit there. It's here she meets Palmer Joss, played by our man Matthew McConaughey, a charismatic Christian philosopher and author. They share a little bit of, uh, a bit of a romantic connection there.

[00:18:37] Trevor Long: I love the way you describe it in the script as an intense romantic.

[00:18:39] Stephen Fenech: Yes, intense and romantic. Yeah, they also though debating Science versus subjective faith.

[00:18:48] Movie Audio: What's wrong with science being practical, even profitable? Nothing, as long as your motive is the search for truth, which is exactly what the pursuit of science is. Well, that's a rather interesting position coming from a man on a crusade against the evils of technology, Father Joss. I'm not against technology, Doctor. I'm against against the men who deify it at the expense of human truth. Kent, been meaning to have a word with you over here, please. Yeah, I'll just— I think that hurt my chances with that interview. What do you think?

[00:19:31] Movie Audio: You're a priest?

[00:19:34] Movie Audio: No, not really. I, uh, Got my master's in divinity. Then I dropped out of seminary and went off and did some secular humanitarian work, coordinating efforts with third-world churches. Couldn't live with the whole celibacy thing. You could, um, you could call me a man of the cloth without the cloth.

[00:20:01] Movie Audio: Want to get out of here?

[00:20:04] Stephen Fenech: Boom! There was definitely no cloth after that.

[00:20:06] Trevor Long: That's right.

[00:20:07] Stephen Fenech: Um, 14 months later, remember how, uh, sorry, no, before that, remember Dr. Drumlin we were hearing?

[00:20:15] Trevor Long: Yeah, he comes to town and they were all excited but also a little bit worried because he obviously makes the decisions about funding.

[00:20:22] Stephen Fenech: And they got shut down.

[00:20:25] Movie Audio: Is it true? I'll let you pull the plug.

[00:20:27] Movie Audio: I know you can't say no, but I'm doing you a favor. You're far too promising a scientist It's a great pity to be wasting your gifts on this nonsense.

[00:20:34] Movie Audio: Look, I don't consider what could potentially be the most important discovery of the human race nonsense, okay? There's 400 billion stars out there.

[00:20:41] Trevor Long: There's not a star—

[00:20:41] Movie Audio: Stephanie, two probabilities. One, there is intelligent life out there, but it's so far away you'll never contact it in your lifetime. And again, I'm making a decision—

[00:20:48] Movie Audio: Two!

[00:20:48] Movie Audio: Two! There's nothing out there but noble gases and carbon compounds, and you're wasting your time. In the meantime, you won't be published. You won't be taken seriously. And your career will be over before it's begun.

[00:20:59] Movie Audio: So what? It's my life.

[00:21:03] Stephen Fenech: So that was a solid argument though. I liked how he said it's either, there is either two options. One, there's something out there, it's so far away, you're never gonna get it. Or B, there's nothing.

[00:21:12] Trevor Long: And she's clearly got the courage of a conviction. She has no desire to do any other scientific research other than this.

[00:21:20] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, absolutely right. So anyway, 14 months later, Ellie and her other colleague, Kent Clark, played by William Fichtner, the blind guy. Yeah, they secure private funding from an eccentric and reclusive billionaire, S.R.

[00:21:35] Trevor Long: Hadden.

[00:21:35] Stephen Fenech: Remember, this was a great scene where these passionate people in the boardroom—

[00:21:39] Trevor Long: and the three people in the boardroom just basically brush her, and then the phone rings like Tony Barber on Sale of the Century. And it's obviously old mate Hadden with the billions, and he's like, no, no, you're going to give her the money, you can look after her. And she notices a camera and she thanks the camera.

[00:21:52] Stephen Fenech: Thank you.

[00:21:53] Trevor Long: Yes, she did.

[00:21:53] Stephen Fenech: They did. Now they relocate to the Very Large Array. That's actually its name, VLA, in New Mexico.

[00:22:00] Trevor Long: Nice.

[00:22:01] Stephen Fenech: Years pass with no results, and Drumlin arrives again threatening to pull the plug on this site as well, which she's like, you can't do that.

[00:22:09] Trevor Long: And he's like, well, he does control, you know, what the government spends their money on.

[00:22:11] Stephen Fenech: Exactly right. Now my other bit of stardust here on this, that was actually where they filmed, actually at the location. Yeah, but in December 2020, the main structure of the antenna collapsed due to poor maintenance in the last few years. There was a hurricane in 2018 that weakened it, the steel cables that kept the platform, because it was like a suspended platform, and it dropped and crashed into the dish, destroying it in the fall.

[00:22:42] Movie Audio: All done.

[00:22:42] Trevor Long: Is this the— that's the original place, not the Very Large Array, the one they were at earlier? Yes, yes.

[00:22:47] Stephen Fenech: No, no, I think this one—

[00:22:49] Trevor Long: no, in the Very Large Array, a bunch Bunch of, bunch of, bunch of—

[00:22:51] Stephen Fenech: sorry, no, large dishes. Yeah, that were the big one where they were originally.

[00:22:55] Trevor Long: Yes, it's gone crazy. Yeah.

[00:22:57] Stephen Fenech: Now, uh, while she's sitting on the hood of her car in the desert, uh, at the VLA, the Very Large Array, she hears an unmistakable rhythmic pulsing through her headphones. Now she rushes back to the control room. The telescopes focus on the star Vega.

[00:23:15] Movie Audio: Talk to me, guys.

[00:23:17] Movie Audio: Partially polarized set of moving pulses, amplitude modulated.

[00:23:20] Trevor Long: We're locked.

[00:23:21] Stephen Fenech: Systems check out. Signal across the board. What's the frequency?

[00:23:24] Movie Audio: 4.4623 gigahertz. Hydrogen times pi. Told you.

[00:23:32] Movie Audio: Strong sucker, too. I got it! I got it!

[00:23:35] Trevor Long: I got it! I'm patched in!

[00:23:36] Movie Audio: All right, let me hear it. Make me a liarfish.

[00:23:50] Movie Audio: Uh, could be AWACS out of Kirtland jamming us, but I'm doubting it.

[00:23:54] Movie Audio: All right, let's see if Fudd's reading it too. Willie, patch it back and give me the off-axis. Are we recording?

[00:24:02] Movie Audio: Never stopped.

[00:24:05] Movie Audio: Thank you, Elmer.

[00:24:06] Movie Audio: AWACS status is negative.

[00:24:09] Movie Audio: What about White Sands?

[00:24:10] Movie Audio: On this frequency, no.

[00:24:12] Movie Audio: I'm gonna punch up the darks. How's the spying tonight, guys? Come on.

[00:24:20] Movie Audio: All right. NORAD's not tracking any snoops in this vector. Shuttle Endeavour's in sleep mode.

[00:24:27] Stephen Fenech: Okay, point source confirmed. Whatever it is, it ain't local.

[00:24:31] Movie Audio: Position?

[00:24:32] Trevor Long: I checked into barometry.

[00:24:33] Stephen Fenech: Somewhere in Lyra, I think.

[00:24:35] Movie Audio: Vega?

[00:24:36] Movie Audio: Can't be. It's only 26 light-years away.

[00:24:39] Movie Audio: Hey, what's the peak intensity coming up? Vega, Vega, man. I scanned it a bunch of times at Arecibo, was negative results always.

[00:24:48] Movie Audio: Got it, reading over 100 Janskis.

[00:24:51] Stephen Fenech: Huge, 100 Janskis.

[00:24:53] Trevor Long: Pretty excited.

[00:24:54] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, my stardust here is that when they're analyzing the signal, he says the signal is over 100 Janskis. A Jansky is a unit of spectral flux density. Used in radio astronomy.

[00:25:06] Trevor Long: I knew that.

[00:25:07] Stephen Fenech: And named after its creator, Karl Jansky.

[00:25:10] Trevor Long: The old Jansky, my son.

[00:25:11] Stephen Fenech: He said, after himself, what are we going to call it?

[00:25:13] Trevor Long: I know what exactly.

[00:25:14] Stephen Fenech: Just quietly too, the signal, you know, that, you know, that sounded a lot like the TARDIS in Doctor Who. Really? Yeah. If you were— were you a Doctor Who fan?

[00:25:21] Trevor Long: No.

[00:25:21] Stephen Fenech: The TARDIS, when it was, when it was coming in and out of time, it was— that's what it sounded like, a little bit like that.

[00:25:26] Trevor Long: Interesting.

[00:25:26] Stephen Fenech: I reckon that they maybe tweaked it. I believe there was some, some sound that they tweaked that sort of was like it, that they may have used, borrowed a little bit of that.

[00:25:36] Trevor Long: Interesting.

[00:25:37] Stephen Fenech: Now the signal is powerful, it's real, and broadcasting a sequence of prime numbers. Yes, prime numbers, a sign of intelligent life.

[00:25:46] Trevor Long: That's true. Okay, yeah, that makes sense.

[00:25:47] Stephen Fenech: We hear later that mathematics is kind of the universal language. Yes. Why aren't they speaking English? Well, hello, mathematics is the true universal language, right? So the government moves in, the VLA is overrun by the military and politicians led by National Security Advisor Michael Kitts, which is in James Woods's character. Kitts views the signal as a potential threat, but Drumlin smoothly comes in to take political credit for Ellie's discovery.

[00:26:11] Trevor Long: We don't like Drumlin at this point.

[00:26:13] Stephen Fenech: Oh man, he sort of just bolted in. Anyway, as science around the world are looking at the signal, they discover a video stream embedded within it. Now they decode the image. Did you— did they like this bit where they were— all you see first of all is like Hang on a minute, is that a swastika? Yeah. And then it goes out further and further, and they're horrified to see a picture of Adolf Hitler at the 1936 Berlin Olympics.

[00:26:39] Movie Audio: Does anybody speak German?

[00:26:43] Movie Audio: I declare the games in Berlin at the celebration of the first Olympics of the new era is open. Get me the White House.

[00:27:06] Movie Audio: 20 million people died defeating that son of a bitch, and he's our first ambassador to outer space?

[00:27:11] Stephen Fenech: Actually, the Hitler broadcast—

[00:27:12] Movie Audio: The 1936 Olympics was the first television transmission of any power that went into space. That they recorded it and sent it back is simply a way of saying, hello, we heard you. Or Sieg Heil, you're our kind of people.

[00:27:22] Movie Audio: Wait a minute, Hitler and his politics have nothing to do with this. I mean, it's highly unlikely that they would understand what they were looking at, and people need to understand the science. The people are in very good hands, Dr. Arroway. We'll take it from here. The White House has just released a statement confirming that a message of unknown origin emanating from deep space has been received by American scientists. Claire Shipman is at the White House. Donna, we've just been told that the president will have only a few brief remarks about today's extraordinary announcement and that he won't be taking any questions from the press.

[00:27:52] Trevor Long: Could you imagine?

[00:27:54] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:27:54] Trevor Long: If that came across the news.

[00:27:56] Stephen Fenech: Oh, mate.

[00:27:56] Trevor Long: We'd have to cancel everything we're doing. Like, there's no way we'd ever be on the media for weeks. But crazy. Like, just imagine.

[00:28:05] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:28:05] Trevor Long: The headlines.

[00:28:06] Movie Audio: Yeah.

[00:28:07] Trevor Long: Like, we've received a message from outer space.

[00:28:10] Movie Audio: Yeah.

[00:28:11] Stephen Fenech: That would be phenomenal. Phenomenal. But as they, they alluded to earlier, as, uh, Drumlin, as much as you hate him, he's right. They're so far away, it's unlikely that, that— and mate, I, I'm a, I'm an astronomer, right? So I like to look through my telescope. A lot of the stuff I'm looking at is millions of light years away. So, and I think Vega— I have to do some homework— is it actually 26 light years away? I'm not sure.

[00:28:36] Trevor Long: 26 is relatively Well, they had a scientific advisor on this, so you think so.

[00:28:41] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, but you know what? The scientists discover a deeper layer of data inside the signal.

[00:28:48] Trevor Long: Yes.

[00:28:49] Stephen Fenech: And, uh, it seems though it's scrambled. Ellie is stuck until she looks like hieroglyphics. Yes. Uh, she's secretly flown to the private plane of S.R. Hadden. Hadden, who is dying of cancer, by the way, he's had— he does reveal The Breakthrough.

[00:29:11] Movie Audio: You found the primer. Clever girl. Lights. Pages and pages of data. Over 60 3,000 in all. And on the perimeter of each—

[00:29:36] Movie Audio: alignment symbols, uh, registration mark, but they don't line up.

[00:29:40] Movie Audio: They do if you think like a Vagan. An alien intelligence is going to be more advanced, and that means efficiency functioning on multiple levels and in multiple dimensions.

[00:29:59] Movie Audio: Yes, of course. Where's the Primer?

[00:30:03] Movie Audio: You see, every three-dimensional page contains a piece of the Primer. There it was all the time, staring you in the face. Buried within the message itself is the key to decoding it.

[00:30:21] Stephen Fenech: So the scrambled data is basically a blueprint for a massive machine designed to hold a single one-person passenger.

[00:30:32] Movie Audio: It is our belief that the message contains instructions for building something, some kind of machine. A machine that does what, Doctor? Well, we don't know. It might be some type of advanced communication device, or it could be a teaching machine of some kind, or It might turn out to be some kind of a transport.

[00:30:56] Movie Audio: Transport? There's no proof of that. The fact is, you don't know what it does. It could be anything. It could be a Trojan horse. We build it and out pours the entire Vagan army. Why bother even risking the personnel? It could be a weapon. Right, some kind of a doomsday machine. Exactly. Every time they detect a new civilization, they fax down these construction documents from outer space. We pour 7,000 men in. Saps build whatever this thing is and blow ourselves to kingdom come.

[00:31:20] Movie Audio: There's no reason to believe that their intentions are hostile.

[00:31:23] Movie Audio: Is it the default position of the eggheads that, that aliens would always be benign? Why is that, Doctor?

[00:31:29] Movie Audio: We pose no threat to them. It would be like us going out of our way to destroy a few microbes on some anthill in Africa.

[00:31:36] Stephen Fenech: That's a good point.

[00:31:37] Trevor Long: But it's interesting because it presents the, the counter which absolutely would be required. Like, as we just said, if this happened in real world It'd be like, can you imagine the behind-the-scenes meetings about—

[00:31:47] Stephen Fenech: there'd be caution, there'd be caution.

[00:31:48] Trevor Long: What are we doing? Yeah.

[00:31:50] Stephen Fenech: And imagine, would you like the fact that they actually go ahead and build the thing? It's crazy. They're thinking, well, what we don't know, they don't know what they're—

[00:31:56] Trevor Long: I don't know what they're building.

[00:31:57] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. So there's a bit of a leap of faith going on.

[00:31:59] Trevor Long: Very much so.

[00:32:00] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. So the nations of the world unite to construct this multi-trillion-dollar machine at Cape Canaveral. A global panel forms to choose the candidacy pod pilot. Ellie's a front-runner, but during her interview, Palmer Joss, now a member of the panel, asks a very simple question: do you believe in God? And this sort of whole— she admits honestly that she's a legitimate scientist.

[00:32:25] Trevor Long: Yeah, who clearly doesn't believe in God. And he knew that that would be a deal-breaker for her because the whole premise of, you know, okay, you're going in, you're gonna be one person to represent human race, you may not come back. We can't have you out there going, you don't believe in God. We want them to know that we believe in God. It's a weird thing, but it's the majority faith.

[00:32:48] Stephen Fenech: But interestingly, the suddenly pious David Drumlin slips in and he becomes the candidate. So she's rejected. So Drumlin's in, she's out. And there is, in between these scenes, there's also a little conversation between Matthew McConaughey, between Joss Palmer and Ellie saying that, I think, 'cause they'd had a romantic connection previously. And he was saying, he said, "Well, you realize that, you know, theory of relativity, then if 4 years pass here, 50, you are gone for 4 years, 50 years have passed back in on Earth. So basically everyone you know is gonna be dead." Yeah.

[00:33:24] Trevor Long: And which is an inane argument because everyone she knows is dead.

[00:33:28] Stephen Fenech: Exactly right.

[00:33:28] Trevor Long: She's— In terms of her love, her mom, her dad.

[00:33:31] Stephen Fenech: Absolutely right. Right, um, well, see, and Elle is now on the outer, but they've built the machine and ready to go. And but during a live, the televised test run of the machine, she's still involved, she's still there.

[00:33:47] Trevor Long: Yeah, she's got the headset on, she's a scientific advisor.

[00:33:50] Stephen Fenech: But do you remember there were like various scenes scattered there with some protesters, and there was this one blonde-headed kid, Gary Busey's son, his name's Jake Busey, that guy. And unmistakable, like long blonde hair. She's sort of in the mission control there, and sort of— she spots this same guy disguised as a technician on the gantry.

[00:34:13] Movie Audio: We've got a security problem here.

[00:34:16] Movie Audio: Ellie, are you sure?

[00:34:18] Movie Audio: Yeah, this guy, he shouldn't be there. I know him.

[00:34:20] Movie Audio: Jerry, execute the rapid shutdown sequence. Security, move the emergency response team into position.

[00:34:25] Movie Audio: One, get me Drummond on a secure loop, please.

[00:34:28] Movie Audio: Master power. Got him.

[00:34:29] Movie Audio: David, can you hear me?

[00:34:31] Movie Audio: Yes, I hear.

[00:34:33] Movie Audio: We've got a security breach here, right behind you. The tall guy, the technician. See him?

[00:34:40] Movie Audio: Ring drive power is off.

[00:34:43] Movie Audio: He's not supposed to be there. David, he's got Something in his hand.

[00:34:53] Movie Audio: Hey, take him! Security breach! Bomb!

[00:34:56] Trevor Long: He's got a bomb!

[00:34:57] Movie Audio: He's got a bomb! I want that emergency response team up on the Gatling now! Security stage 1 alert!

[00:35:02] Trevor Long: This is all live on TV too.

[00:35:04] Movie Audio: Crazy.

[00:35:04] Trevor Long: So what the world sees— everyone's watching —is an explosion.

[00:35:19] Stephen Fenech: So before security can act, he's detonated a suicide bomb.

[00:35:27] Trevor Long: And again, going back to imagine if this happened today, this would be the highest rating television broadcast in the history of society. So you got—

[00:35:36] Stephen Fenech: everyone would be watching. This happened— so this movie came out before 9/11. Yeah. So this was, I think, The just my first question is, well, how lax was security? Like, come on. Yeah. Our attitudes pre and post 9/11, I reckon securities are totally different.

[00:35:53] Trevor Long: So you think this wouldn't have been believable if it was released today?

[00:35:55] Stephen Fenech: Perhaps. Interesting. Perhaps. I think there would have been a bit tighter security.

[00:35:58] Trevor Long: Funny, I didn't give it any second thought other than to think that he was an extremist. He would have done anything to get in there.

[00:36:03] Stephen Fenech: So yeah, but like he walked in strapped with a bomb to his shoes. Yeah. Anyway. Ah, so the explosion kills Drumlin, destroys the machine, project devastated. Yeah, the whole thing's over basically.

[00:36:20] Trevor Long: They're not— because there was so much— there was political tension about who's paying for it, how much it's costing. You're like, they're never going to build this thing again. Yeah, why would they?

[00:36:26] Stephen Fenech: But she's contacted again by Hadden. Yeah, and this is the part where she goes back to her apartment. There's a satellite and a TV, it's all set up in her apartment. She's thinking, what the hell's going on?

[00:36:35] Trevor Long: An old mate. It's not a phone call from a plane, he's in space. He's on the Russian space station.

[00:36:40] Stephen Fenech: So, uh, you know, to ease his cancer symptoms, but he does reveal a massive secret.

[00:36:49] Movie Audio: Hokkaido Island, the systems integration site.

[00:36:55] Movie Audio: Look closer. Rule in government spending. Why build one when you can have two at twice the price? Wow. Only this one can be kept secret. Controlled by Americans, built by the Japanese subcontractors, who also happen to be recently acquired wholly owned subsidiaries of Haddon Industries. They still want an American to go, Doctor.

[00:37:43] Trevor Long: Boom! Great music. Wanna take a ride? Wanna take a ride?

[00:37:49] Stephen Fenech: Love that. So the second machine built concurrently in Hokkaido in Japan. That's the most northern island, by the way. I remember from my geography days. Sure, yeah. Away from the public eyes. Because Ellie was the runner-up, she has chosen to go.

[00:38:06] Trevor Long: And I love the fact that we don't muck around here, it's just get straight into it. Yeah, she's being straight in, strapped into the machine, let's go.

[00:38:12] Stephen Fenech: So it's built, it's ready to go, she's inside a sphere-shaped IPV, Individual Transport Vehicle capsule. Now the machine's massive rings are spinning up, creating a glowing energy vortex.

[00:38:26] Trevor Long: It's, it's, yeah, I mean, this is where I go back to my tweet. This is where you go, I can believe this. Like, I can believe it would be some machine like this. You wouldn't just be a space shuttle, you know what I mean? Like, you get the sense. We've all watched enough stupid Star Wars to realize—

[00:38:40] Stephen Fenech: stupid Star Wars, how dare you!

[00:38:41] Trevor Long: It's not just a jet engine, there's some stuff going on. How dare you describe Star Wars like that.

[00:38:46] Stephen Fenech: But, um, yeah, so she's in there and the rings are spinning up and there's like lightning and light coming out of it and, uh, there's a glowing thing and she's being like—

[00:38:54] Trevor Long: she's got a camera on, she's live broadcasting this and it's breaking up a bit.

[00:38:56] Stephen Fenech: Good to go.

[00:38:58] Movie Audio: I'm ready to go.

[00:38:58] Trevor Long: Yeah, she keeps saying, I'm good to go, I'm good to go. And the blind guy who's obviously got better hearing, 'cause that's what happens with your senses, they're all thinking, hang on, is she gone? And he's like, no, no, I can hear her. She's good to go. Like it's a really good way of using all the characters there.

[00:39:12] Stephen Fenech: The tension builds and then the capsule is dropped directly into the center of the rings.

[00:39:18] Trevor Long: And this is where like it becomes a journey of a little sci-fi because you're like, okay, what is a wormhole? What does it look like to go through one? And it's a journey.

[00:39:30] Stephen Fenech: So in the control room, the capsule drops straight through the rings.

[00:39:33] Trevor Long: Well, you don't know that at this point.

[00:39:35] Stephen Fenech: Well, it's gravity.

[00:39:37] Trevor Long: Yeah, but we don't know that yet.

[00:39:38] Stephen Fenech: Understand, but the capsule's dropped, and for those observing, it's just dropped straight through. Correct. For the viewer of the movie, we don't know that yet. No, but inside the capsule, different story. Yeah, she's experiencing this mind-bending journey. She's traveling through wormholes and witnessing cosmic phenomena, and, uh, and and then the blinding light of Vega. But then she's overwhelmed by the beauty of this, of this world around her.

[00:40:02] Trevor Long: She realizes she's a scientist, and I think she says they should have sent a poet.

[00:40:06] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, you know. The capsule stabilizes, and Ellie finds herself looking out at a surreal beach that resembles a childhood drawing she made of Pensacola.

[00:40:17] Trevor Long: Did you remember this drawing she contacted? Yeah. An entity approaches her.

[00:40:22] Stephen Fenech: And takes the physical form of her deceased father Ted. This was emotional, dude. This was emotional. Hard. She realizes it's an alien using her memories to make her more comfortable.

[00:40:36] Movie Audio: Why did you contact us? You contacted us. We were just listening. And there are others? Many others.

[00:40:50] Movie Audio: They all travel here through that transit system that you built.

[00:40:55] Movie Audio: We didn't build it. We don't know who did. No, they were gone long before we ever got here. Maybe someday they'll come back.

[00:41:08] Movie Audio: All the other civilizations that you find, they come here? Not all.

[00:41:13] Movie Audio: You're an interesting species. An interesting mix. You're capable of such beautiful dreams. Mm. And such horrible nightmares.

[00:41:25] Movie Audio: You feel so lost.

[00:41:28] Movie Audio: So cut off. So alone.

[00:41:32] Trevor Long: Only you're not.

[00:41:35] Movie Audio: See, in all our searching, The only thing we've found that makes the emptiness bearable is each other.

[00:41:44] Movie Audio: What happens now?

[00:41:47] Movie Audio: Now you go home.

[00:41:51] Movie Audio: Home? But I have so many questions. Do we get to come back?

[00:41:59] Movie Audio: This was just the first step. In time, you'll take another.

[00:42:05] Movie Audio: But other people need to see what I've seen.

[00:42:07] Movie Audio: They need to see this is the way it's been done for billions of years. Small moves, Ellie. Small moves. Wow, that's what he said.

[00:42:20] Trevor Long: That is tough to watch. Yeah, it's tough to watch. Yeah, because she saw him and hugged him and thought, oh, you know, um, that'd be the cruelest thing for, uh, you know, to be, you know, encounter, you know, alien life or whatever, and to have them take the form of your deceased.

[00:42:36] Stephen Fenech: Obviously intelligent, eh? They're intelligent life. It's, um, it's— that's a whole other show right there. But yeah, yeah, Ellie wakes up inside the capsule which is sitting safely in the Japanese net. Yep. Now from Earth's perspective, the capsule fell in a blink of an eye.

[00:42:51] Trevor Long: And this is, this is what they're all like, oh, didn't they? Straight away they're like, it didn't work, sorry Ellie. You know, they're— she's like, what are you talking about it didn't work? And they're like, it just dropped, that's all that happened. And that's when you realize, so all they recorded didn't pass because you're thinking, how old is everyone going to be? You know, as a viewer of this movie, you're sitting there going, shit, back, how old is everyone going to be? Will it still be there? Did it— like, he's so invested in that whole you're going to be 50 years round trip.

[00:43:13] Stephen Fenech: Really turns the theory of relativity on its head, doesn't it? Yeah. So, but she, like, according to everyone else, she fell in a blink of an eye, landed, her headset recording nothing but static. That's it. So she's in before a hostile congressional inquiry led by Michael Kitz, and he accuses her of being, uh, the victim of a massive hoax orchestrated by S.R. Hadden before his death. He— remember, he dies, uh, after that. Yep. Ellie admits she has no physical proof, no data, no photos, but she refuses to recant her experience. Yes.

[00:43:46] Movie Audio: You admit that if you were in our position, you would respond with exactly the same degree of incredulity and skepticism? Yes. Then why don't you simply withdraw your testimony and concede that this journey to the center of the galaxy in fact never took place?

[00:44:04] Movie Audio: Because I can't. I had an experience. I can't prove it. I can't even explain it. But everything that I I know as a human being, everything that I am tells me that it was real. I was given something wonderful, something that changed me forever. A vision of the universe that tells us undeniably how tiny and insignificant and how rare and precious we all are. A vision that tells us that we belong that we belong to something that is greater than ourselves, that we are not, that none of us are alone. I wish I could share that. I wish that everyone, if even for one moment, could feel that awe and humility and a hope But that continues to be my wish.

[00:45:22] Stephen Fenech: So you can imagine the whole world thinking, well, she's hallucinated.

[00:45:26] Trevor Long: Yeah. I mean, the whole world watched a thing drop into a net. Yeah, that's it. And so it's a very tough sell.

[00:45:31] Stephen Fenech: Yes. But what happens? She leaves the hearing. Lots of people support her. Yeah. A lot of supporters. Palmer Joss takes her hand, telling the press that while he may not share her scientific beliefs, He believes her, of course. Now, inside a limousine, Kitz and the White House Chief of Staff, which is Angela Bassett's character, discuss a highly classified piece of information. Static was recorded, nothing but static. Exactly. But it recorded for 18 hours of static, which is kind of— she refers to that earlier before the hearing. And but, uh Uh, yeah, no one believes her. But sometime later, uh, Ellie's granted ongoing funding at the VLA in New Mexico, and the film finishes with her sitting on the edge of the canyon looking out over the satellite dishes and turning to a group of children to teach them about the wonders of the cosmos. She also picks up a bit of sand and sees the same constellation that she was showing. And also later I'll tell you how it matched something else that happened in the movie. Yeah. All right. All right. Let's get to the lines. Did you catch your favorite? This is a very good one. Yes.

[00:46:40] Movie Audio: So it turns out there's life on other planets. Boy, this is really going to change the Miss Universe contest, don't you think? I mean, gee, we're going to have to—

[00:46:47] Stephen Fenech: That's good. Apparently they filmed that. They were on one of his shows. Richard Roberts and Mecca said, look, we're going to— we need to do a bit extra for our movie. This audience was kept in there and he did this bit during a live— not during a live— in a break. He did it for from.

[00:47:02] Trevor Long: Yeah, nice.

[00:47:03] Stephen Fenech: Um, here's another one. Uh, and again, this is, this is where it gets deep, you know, gets to the heart of, you know, faith versus science. Yes.

[00:47:10] Movie Audio: And it says, all things being equal, the simplest explanation tends to be the right one. Makes sense to me. All right, so what's more likely? Thank you. You're welcome. An all-powerful mysterious God created the universe and then decided not to give any proof of his existence, or that he's God simply doesn't exist at all, and that we created him so we wouldn't have to feel so small and alone.

[00:47:34] Movie Audio: I don't know. I couldn't imagine living in a world where God didn't exist. I wouldn't want to.

[00:47:42] Movie Audio: How do you know you're not deluding yourself? I mean, for me, I'd need proof.

[00:47:50] Movie Audio: Proof? Did you love your father? What? Your dad, did you love him?

[00:47:59] Movie Audio: Yes, very much.

[00:48:05] Stephen Fenech: Prove it. That's it. Boom! How do you— yeah, amazing.

[00:48:09] Trevor Long: Yeah, it's a great line.

[00:48:10] Stephen Fenech: And here's another line that pops up actually several times during the movie.

[00:48:14] Movie Audio: I'll tell you one thing about the universe though. The universe This is a pretty big place. It's bigger than anything anyone has ever dreamed of before. So if it's just us, seems like an awful waste of space.

[00:48:38] Stephen Fenech: So that, I have one more remark here, is that the, that was said throughout the movie, I think 3 times. Yep. And it's a famous, It's, it would be a terrible waste of space is a famous quote by Carl Sagan, but it references a statement made by the Scottish essayist Thomas Carlyle who said the potential worlds of other stars, he said, a sad spectacle if they inhabited, what a scope for misery and folly if they are not inhabited, what a waste of space. Yeah. So yeah, how did that happen? Um, Well, one, I'm gonna give one little plot point, but also I'm gonna give you book v novel real quickly, the difference. When Ellie is saying— she says that she traveled for about 18 hours. How does she know that? She didn't know her exact duration of her— how would you know it's been 18 hours? You get a sense. You think so? Maybe. Yeah, she didn't have a watch on. No. And there was no clock or anything in there. So yeah, be subjective. Time is very hard to reckon.

[00:49:45] Trevor Long: Yes, very, very true.

[00:49:46] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, uh, book v novel, some important changes. In the book, Palmer Joss is a preacher who represents different religious points of view. In the movie, he's an aspiring priest who failed in the process. Yeah, Ellie's mother divorces Ted— she was alive in the book— Ted Arroway, to marry John Staunton, who later is revealed to be Ellie's real father as a result of an infidelity city when she, with John, while she was still married to Ted. Irrelevant. Well, it's good, good, good. In the movie, Joanna died of complications during Ellie's birth.

[00:50:20] Trevor Long: Yeah, yeah, stick with that.

[00:50:22] Stephen Fenech: Ellie is helped by a scientist advisor named Ken DeHear, having a love relation with him in the movie instead of with Parmajos. Uh, and in the book, 5 team members were selected to go into the machine. In the movie, Ellie is the only one. In the book, David Drumlin dies saving Ellie during the sabotage of the first machine. In the movie, Drumlin dies trying to stop the saboteur. Okay. Yeah. The speaker workout. Well, where do you start here? The signal's pretty good. Yeah, nice there. The sound of the machine, the trip when she goes through the trip. Yeah, that's a machine.

[00:50:58] Trevor Long: Yeah, that's a nice speaker rattling off the walls. Yeah, pretty good.

[00:51:02] Stephen Fenech: Good music too. Did you find that a nice soundtrack? I quite enjoyed That, uh, thank God I got a big screen. The machine scenes, you know, the rings twisting around and the shots of the, you know, the trip to Vega and the, the beach and, uh, beautiful shots of the dishes and the antenna array, which is— that's, that's really cool. Yeah, yeah, the zoom out, that was amazing. Yeah, it's great. All right, uh, the business here, we're talking about SETI, which is real. Yes, you— it was, uh, a nonprofit funded in 1984 based in California. They conduct research across multiple disciplines—astrobiology, planetary environments, astronomy—and leading projects to scan the cosmos for electromagnetic transmissions or optical signals from alien civilizations. And SETI, there's a research center in Australia based in Brisbane. There you go. Yeah, uh, if the movie was made today, I think the security around that machine would have been way tighter, so sabotage would have been a long shot. Shot there. Yes, I think so. Don't you reckon the attitude is different?

[00:52:07] Trevor Long: Yep. And there would have been— I think the biggest thing if the movie was made today would be the whole how do you hide the fact that she didn't really go for 18 hours or however many hours it was. There'd be more tracking, like you'd have health metrics on a Whoop or something. You'd be like, hang on a minute, her Oura Ring said she's, you know, she's maybe was active for that long.

[00:52:25] Stephen Fenech: But also too, the whole— I reckon there would have been a bit more through social media, there would have been a bit more sort of God v science kind of argument online.

[00:52:34] Trevor Long: Instead of seeing the protest physically, there would have been online.

[00:52:36] Stephen Fenech: And instead of seeing the headlines, you know, the magazine headlines and stuff like that, would have been— yes, more social media presence. Spot on. Um, maybe she should— if it was made today, she could have just strapped a GoPro to herself. Probably GoPro. Uh, every day is a school day. What is our theme or lesson here?

[00:52:54] Trevor Long: I mean, I think this is— is this where we get deep on the whole theological part of this?

[00:52:58] Stephen Fenech: Well, it's science v faith, I reckon. I reckon.

[00:53:00] Trevor Long: So here's my hot take as a non-faith human, right? Right. This, I think this is a great argument for faith because you could say, 'cause there's a line, I thought I wrote it down. We didn't build it, we don't know who did, right? Yeah, yeah. So you've traveled to Vega or somewhere. On a machine. You're talking to this projection of yourself. Itself and they don't know who built it. Who's to say God didn't build it all? Yeah, like, what my thing about that is, why are we not— like, they talk about the Big Bang and all that— why are we not assuming that's how God created the universe?

[00:53:42] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, that's right.

[00:53:42] Trevor Long: Like, how is that not the argument?

[00:53:43] Stephen Fenech: How did it start? Yeah, that's right, mate. That's a— this has been going on for— this argument's been going on for normally the argument just—

[00:53:50] Trevor Long: time immemorial— with, well, we've got— we've proven there's real things happening in space, so your little book doesn't matter. Yeah, but the little book just talks about, about the Son of God and Jesus. It doesn't really talk about the big fella that I know anyway. Yeah. And so for me, it just made me go, I could, I could lean either way. Like, I didn't leave the movie going, yeah, I'm, I'm all on board science here. I just left the movie going, I don't see how you couldn't see. And I think that's probably part of the scripting and getting approval from Hollywood, because, you know, you can't just be shitcanning God in Hollywood, right? So I felt like they, they cultivated the message so that you could believe either way. And I think they did that successfully.

[00:54:27] Stephen Fenech: Well, interesting correlation to this. Do you remember in— there was a line, remember, about, do you love your father? Well, prove it. Well, yeah, right. So that— but in— do you remember in Interstellar where there was a scene where Anne Hathaway's character said, well, love is the only thing that you can't— that science can't explain? Yeah, it's like faith. Remember, there's a scene in it of talking about love and how that's just this emotion that is just unaffected by science and everything else. And by time time. And that's sort of where these intersect for me. Yeah. But it's also the sort of whole— there's also a sort of theme of the intellectual integrity and, you know, the what is the truth, cost of truth, sort of who's gonna— like the government, they, you know, they gave her a hard time in the hearing knowing that there was 18 hours of data.

[00:55:15] Trevor Long: But knowing that there was a piece of evidence that they're clear. So yeah. What do you do?

[00:55:18] Stephen Fenech: Do you tell the truth? Do you hold that to yourself? Where's your Integrity lie in truth, in science, in faith. That's the whole argument. Yeah, no, it's fair. Uh, best use of the pause button. If you notice, when in the MIT yearbook that's shown with Dr. Arroway's photo, it's the real MIT undergraduate yearbook for the class of 1983. Really? With the exception of Jodie Foster, all the other pictures are real. You'd be filthy if you were the one that got pulled out.

[00:55:46] Trevor Long: Hey, yeah, you'd be like, oh, there's everyone except Bill. Why didn't they include Bill? They put Jodie Foster's face there.

[00:55:52] Stephen Fenech: That's like when you get your quote read out at this Apple event. Stephen French. Yeah, there you go. Uh, things you might not know. I mentioned this already. Carl Sagan was due to make a cameo as a member of the committee that was selecting an occupant for the machine, but died before the scene was filmed. Uh, President Clinton's appearance—

[00:56:08] Trevor Long: yeah, what's all that about—

[00:56:09] Stephen Fenech: was taken from an actual press conference on the White House South Lawn in 1997. His remarks refer to the real-life discovery of an Arctic meteorite that turned out to be from Mars. Now, the altered footage caused some controversy. 5 years later, CNN banned the use of its logo in fictional movies. CNN reporters are not allowed to do movie cameos, although Larry King appears in this movie as well from time to time. Uh, did you notice as well, uh, the UFO abduction insurance banner across an RV is from a real company? Wow. Warner Brothers paid them to use their idea in the movie, to have that banner The filmmakers also put out a call for UFO enthusiasts for the—

[00:56:53] Trevor Long: remember the scene they're driving through the desert?

[00:56:55] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Most of their extras bought their own wardrobe and props. Wow. Did you notice the ending scene? Remember the limo with Ellie and Palmer driving away from the Capitol Building? Yeah. Uh, curious landscaping, how it's been doctored a bit. The road in front of the building is not curved, and additionally, the Capitol Building has been rotated 180 degrees. So the back is the front, if you're aware of Washington geography. Yeah. Another, did you notice that she spoke to an Aussie? Remember she contacted Ian Broderick? That's right. Yeah. Remember he's on the science team. CSIRO. Said Ian Broderick, CSIRO control room. CSIRO is Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation. Full Aussie, Aussie, you know, proper accent. Yeah. Yep. And, uh, as you know, it's an Australian federal government agency, invented Wi-Fi. That's a nice little, nice little credit. Created in 1916, one of the leading organizations for science and investigation. One other did you know: during one of the stops in her trip through the wormhole, that— remember she noticed the crescent of 4 stars in the sky? Yeah. Later, when she lands on the beach and she sees the sun same, uh, for— she picks up a handful of sand and the 4 grains of sand in the same pattern. At the end of the movie, she sits on the ground, look, and picks up a palmful of gravel. 4 bits of gravel sparkle. Yeah. And the pattern is first seen as popcorn scattered on the floor in the scene where Ellie finds her dad unconscious. Oh wow. There's also that constellation. That's crazy. Yeah. What's the meme? Yeah, I'd say it's an awfully big waste of space. If you— that, I reckon you could put— turn that into a meme.

[00:58:46] Trevor Long: I don't know, you could. You get— it's, it's a serious topic, but we didn't build it, we don't know who did could be put against a picture of a monstrous house or something, you know, or pyramids or something.

[00:58:55] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or I like Small Moves, Sparks. Remember he calls the Sparks Small Moves? Yeah. Or— and I'm okay to go. Yes, okay to go.

[00:59:03] Trevor Long: Yeah, that's actually a really good one.

[00:59:05] Stephen Fenech: I'm okay to go, baby. Uh, by any other name, this is a tough one. I would have simply called it Space. Well, that means you too. Well, Contact tells you what it's about. Very good. Contact's really hard to beat. I thought another one, Spirit of Discovery or something like that, or you could call it Searching. Searching, maybe. Listening. Uh, I think the Contact really—

[00:59:28] Trevor Long: I think they nailed it. Contact is an an active, you know, kind of makes you go, okay, we made contact. Yeah, do you know what I mean? Yeah, something you put in your eyes, it assumes it. Yeah.

[00:59:36] Stephen Fenech: Uh, the one thing you want?

[00:59:38] Trevor Long: The headset from the, from the journey.

[00:59:39] Stephen Fenech: That'd be pretty cool. Ellie's headset, uh, her uniform. Yeah, the capsule. Take the capsule.

[00:59:45] Trevor Long: Oh, have you got so much space?

[00:59:46] Stephen Fenech: And her original radio she was using at the start, you know. Oh wow, that radio, I'll take that any day of the week. Yeah, right. Uh, 3 questions for Trev. Hit me. What What happens to Ellie and Palmer? Do they become colleagues? Does it get more serious? Is there— what's going to go on?

[01:00:02] Trevor Long: I think there's a future for them. Yeah.

[01:00:04] Stephen Fenech: Okay. So is that interesting, a partnership where she's a scientist and he's sort of more religious man, and they, you know, they've got their differences? She's, you know, the dinner table would be very lively conversation.

[01:00:14] Trevor Long: That's why it's fascinating. She's just had a religious experience, perhaps in many ways. Some would perhaps, like, if it was a religious person that went out there. Yeah, they would think they met God. They would have come back saying, "I saw God in the form of my father telling me these things." Maybe.

[01:00:30] Stephen Fenech: Do you know what I mean? Hard to explain. Yeah. Is it hard? Question 2, sequel, prequel, or leave it alone? I think you could sequel this. I reckon sequel the hell out of this.

[01:00:39] Trevor Long: Like, what are we doing? Are we going again? Who's going? They do it again. Yeah, they do another one.

[01:00:42] Stephen Fenech: Can we fit 2 people in there?

[01:00:44] Trevor Long: What's gonna happen? And then it's storming the Capitol, go, "I wanna go.", but it's, you know, it becomes a whole.

[01:00:49] Stephen Fenech: Or they hear a signal from somewhere else as well. And another one.

[01:00:53] Trevor Long: And, or maybe while they're there, they detect, you know, the other signal. And they meet another life form.

[01:00:59] Stephen Fenech: Maybe. Interesting. Question 3, too long, too short, or just right?

[01:01:03] Trevor Long: It probably bordered on too long, but that was okay.

[01:01:05] Stephen Fenech: I reckon you could easily snip 10 minutes of this.

[01:01:08] Trevor Long: There's 10, there's 10. Yeah.

[01:01:09] Stephen Fenech: I reckon you can tighten it up a bit for sure. Okay, that is our, that is Contact. Give us your wrap up and wrap up. Brady.

[01:01:16] Trevor Long: Oh God, I wasn't ready for this. Um, look, I really enjoyed the movie. Okay, there's no, no question, I really enjoyed the movie.

[01:01:24] Stephen Fenech: Um, you know, it's thought-provoking, wasn't it? Yeah, thought-provoking.

[01:01:28] Trevor Long: And I think the fact that it made me think about, you know, the faith versus science thing, not because I'm curious, but because normally, normally in a movie I think you're given, like, you, you've got to believe it's faith, or do you know what I mean? Like, it's not rammed down your throat, but I feel like it is. Whereas this left it open, and I think anyone from any side could have debate and conversation. I think that's really cool. I really enjoyed it. It's probably, uh, it's probably an 8.5 for me.

[01:01:54] Stephen Fenech: Me, exactly that. Oh wow, we're even. We are on the money, on the money. Yeah, no, thanks for that one. So we talk about next week, different type of movie next week, change of gears next week. Okay, we are watching The 40-Year-Old Virgin. Oh, righty-o, that's definitely a change of gears, starring Steve Carell, Seth Rogen, Morgan, Catherine Keener. Yep. Paul Rudd. Directed and co-written by Judd Apatow, a giant in comedy movies. My question for you is, which of these movies did Judd Apatow— is he— did he not direct? Now, some pretty big comedies here. One of these he didn't direct. Okay. All right, is it A, Anchorman? B, Knocked Up? C, C, Funny People, or D, Trainwreck? Knocked Up. He directed Knocked Up. Damn, he did direct Anchorman. Adam McKay directed.

[01:02:46] Trevor Long: That would have been my—

[01:02:47] Stephen Fenech: but he produced Anchorman, he wasn't a director. So that's not fair. Technicality and Funny People I think had, um, Adam Sandler. Trainwreck was Amy Schumer. Remember that one? Yeah. But anyway, that is—

[01:02:59] Trevor Long: I love how you still ask me after 3 years, do I remember that one?

[01:03:04] Stephen Fenech: Like, I watched the movie. You haven't probably seen it. No, silly question. But I'm glad you enjoyed Contact. Happy with your rating, which is equal to mine. Stephen's biopic next week. I was going to say Trevor's biopic, actually.

[01:03:17] Trevor Long: I wanted to get ahead of it.

[01:03:18] Stephen Fenech: Next week, 40-Year-Old Virgin.

[01:03:20] Trevor Long: Join us then. See you, mate.