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Contact

1997 2h 30m
Drama Science Fiction Mystery
MOVIEVIBE Rating
7.4/10
5,183 reviews
Your Rating
Contact

A radio astronomer receives the first extraterrestrial radio signal ever picked up on Earth. As the world powers scramble to decipher the message and decide upon a course of action, she must make some difficult decisions between her beliefs, the truth, and reality.

"Take a journey to the heart of the universe."

Top Billed Cast

Jodie Foster
Jodie Foster
Ellie Arroway
Matthew McConaughey
Matthew McConaughey
Palmer Joss
James Woods
James Woods
Michael Kitz
John Hurt
John Hurt
S. R. Hadden
Tom Skerritt
Tom Skerritt
David Drumlin
William Fichtner
William Fichtner
Kent
David Morse
David Morse
Ted Arroway
Angela Bassett
Angela Bassett
Rachel Constantine

Detailed Critic & Audience Reviews

T talisencrw Verified TMDB Critic
2016-05-02

I would readily admit this is one of my favourite science fiction films from the 90's. It's intelligent, well-acted and directed, and the special effects it has HELPS the story rather than IMPEDES it. Though she hasn't done much lately, either in the director's chair or acting, Jodie Foster is one of my favourite contemporary American actresses, and it's intriguing how her great talent's been utilized of late (ie., 'Elysium', and I'm still very mad at Spike Lee for having Christopher Plummer call her a 'cunt' in 'Inside Man').

Personally, I must admit that I myself have worried what other w...

J JPV852 Verified TMDB Critic
2021-11-26

Random viewing but decided to finally watch after its been in my to-do bin for a while now. It didn't strike an emotional cord that I thought it would but Jodie Foster was quite good as were a respectable supporting cast. Never quite bought into the relationship between Foster and McConaughey though in fairness, probably due to the lack of screen time together (felt like maybe 15 minutes in a 2.5 hour movie). Some of the effects were alright for its time including integrating Clinton footage with the cast and the sci-fi specific visuals were alright. In the end, never was bored and found it to...

T tmdb28039023 Verified TMDB Critic
2022-08-27

Early on in Contact a character is introduced who goes by the name “Kent Clark,” and for the remainder of the film I simply could not get over the fact that no one ever even mentions that he is named after Bizarro’s alter ego.

My theory is that this is a figurative wink to the audience, letting us know beforehand what we otherwise discover at long last: that the events that are about to unfold are nothing but an elaborate prank on the audience and, possibly, the cast.

This movie exists in a limbo somewhere in between Close Encounters of the Third Kind’s unabashed childlike wonder...

F Filipe Manuel Neto Verified TMDB Critic
2023-12-26

**A film that gets more right than it gets wrong, in a friendly tribute to Carl Sagan.**

The theme of extraterrestrial life will always be a big deal for cinema, and is one of the most solid subjects within sci-fi. On the one hand, it has already given us a series of gems, but it also occasionally gives us films so bad that they are not worth the price of the plastic DVD. This film, for me, stays on positive ground: it gives us a solid story, intelligent enough to be believable, but it completely loses its way when it tries to introduce some action and shake things up a bit.

One of the m...