And while each of these works confronts a different idea and theme, they all share one thing in common: They’re unfilmable, at least a first blush. Considering Chiang has only published fifteen stories, that puts his potential book-to-Hollywood batting average at an impressive 0.400. Add to that two other stories that are currently in conversation with producers, we might be seeing as many as six adaptations movies in the next few years. The story “Understand” is in production with 20th Century Fox, the novella "The Lifecycle of Software Objects" is under option by Brio Films (a producing partner or Michel Gondry's), and the story “Hell Is the Absence of God” has been optioned (though by whom is still a secret).
Heisserer will not be the last screenwriter faced with the challenge of adapting Chiang. But it’s arguably the script by Eric Heisserer that demands the most recognition for how it translates Chiang’s high-concept sci-fi so effortlessly. Villeneuve ( Sicario, next year’s Blade Runner sequel) conjures intimacy and muted tensions to a film of global scale. Amy Adams brings a precise, introspective performance to the film’s hero linguist Dr. Arrival is every bit as sophisticated as its short story origins, and magnificently translated into 2016’s best piece of cerebral science fiction.
Which makes the film adaptation even more impressive for how faithful it is, down to the seven-armed aliens.
In his story, Chiang even includes diagrams to illustrate how light refracts through water-and this moment is supposed to help clarify what’s going on. He addresses things like Fermat’s principle and the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. Whereas most stories and films about first contact deal with confrontation, Chiang is interested in the very complicated basics of communication. Denis Villeneuve’s latest, a heady sci-fi movie starring Amy Adams, is a pretty faithful adaptation of Ted Chiang’s “Story of Your Life,” a short story about an academic linguist trying to understand an alien language after twelve extraterrestrial vessels appear in various parts of the world.
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