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''Contact'' is a 1997 American science fiction drama film directed by Robert Zemeckis. It is a film adaptation of Carl Sagan's 1985 novel of the same name; Sagan and his wife Ann Druyan wrote the story outline for the film. Jodie Foster portrays the film's protagonist, Dr. Eleanor "Ellie" Arroway, a SETI scientist who finds strong evidence of extraterrestrial life and is chosen to make first contact. The film also stars Matthew McConaughey, James Woods, Tom Skerritt, William Fichtner, John Hurt, Angela Bassett, Jake Busey, and David Morse. Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan began working on the film in 1979. Together, they wrote a 100+ page film treatment and set up ''Contact'' at Warner Bros. with Peter Guber and Lynda Obst as producers. When the project to make the film became mired in development hell, Sagan published ''Contact'' as a novel in 1985 and the film adaptation was rejuvenated in 1989. Roland Joffé and George Miller had planned to direct it, but Joffé dropped out in 1993 and Warner Bros. fired Miller in 1995. Robert Zemeckis was eventually hired to direct, and filming for ''Contact'' lasted from September 1996 to February 1997. Sony Pictures Imageworks handled most of the visual effects sequences. The film was released on July 11, 1997, to mostly positive reviews. ''Contact'' grossed approximately $171 million in worldwide box office totals. The film won the Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation and received multiple awards and nominations at the Saturn Awards. The release of ''Contact'' was publicized by controversies from the Clinton administration and CNN, as well as individual lawsuits from George Miller and Francis Ford Coppola. ==Plot== Encouraged to explore as a child by her late father, Dr. Eleanor "Ellie" Arroway (Jodie Foster) works for the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) program at the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. She listens to radio transmissions hoping to find signals sent by extraterrestrial life. Science Advisor to the President David Drumlin (Tom Skerritt) pulls the funding from SETI because he believes the endeavor is futile. Arroway gains backing from secretive billionaire industrialist S. R. Hadden (John Hurt), who has followed her career and allows her to continue her studies at the Very Large Array (VLA) in Socorro County, New Mexico. Four years later, with Drumlin seeking to close SETI, Arroway finds a signal repeating a sequence of prime numbers, apparently sent from the star Vega. This announcement causes Drumlin and the National Security Council, led by National Security Advisor Michael Kitz (James Woods), to attempt to take control of the facility. As Arroway, Drumlin and Kitz argue, members of the team at the VLA discover a video source buried in the signal: Adolf Hitlers welcoming address at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin. Arroway and her team postulate that this would have been the first significantly strong television signal to leave Earth's atmosphere, which was then transmitted back from Vega, 25 light-years away. The project is put under tight security and its progress followed worldwide. Arroway learns that the signal contains more than 60,000 "pages" of what appear to be technical drawings. The reclusive Hadden secretly meets with Arroway on his jet to provide the means to decode the pages, found when they are arranged in three dimensions. The pages reveal a complex machine allowing for one human occupant inside a pod to be dropped into four spinning rings. The nations of the world fund the construction of the machine in Cape Canaveral at the Kennedy Space Center's Launch Complex 39. An international panel is assembled to choose a candidate to travel in the machine. Although Arroway is one of the top selections, Christian philosopher Palmer Joss (Matthew McConaughey), a panel member whom Arroway met in Puerto Rico and with whom she had a brief romantic encounter, brings attention to her lack of religious faith. As this differentiates her from most humans, the panel selects Drumlin as more representative. On the day the machine is tested, a religious fanatic destroys the machine in a suicide bombing, killing Drumlin and many others. A cancer-stricken Hadden, now in residence on the Mir space station, reveals to Arroway that a second machine is hidden in Hokkaido, Japan, and that Arroway will be its pilot. Arroway, outfitted with several recording devices, is locked into the pod of the Japanese machine, dropped into the spinning rings, and disappears. When the pod apparently travels through a series of wormholes, she experiences displacement and can observe the outside environment, including a radio array-like structure at Vega and signs of an advanced civilization on an unknown planet. Arroway finds herself in a surreal beachfront landscape similar to a childhood picture she drew of Pensacola, Florida, and a blurry figure approaches that becomes her deceased father (David Morse). Arroway recognizes him as an alien taking her father's form and attempts to ask questions. The alien deflects her inquiries, explaining that this journey was just humanity's first step to joining other spacefaring species. Arroway considers these answers and falls unconscious. She awakens to find herself on the floor of the pod; the machine's control team is repeatedly calling for her. She learns that from outside the machine it appears the pod merely dropped through the machine's rings and landed in the safety net. Arroway insists that she was gone for approximately 18 hours, but her recording devices show only static. Kitz resigns as National Security Advisor to lead a Congressional Committee to determine whether the machine was a hoax designed by Hadden, who has died. Arroway asks the committee to accept the truth of her testimony on faith. In a private conversation, Kitz and White House Chief of Staff Rachel Constantine (Angela Bassett) reflect on confidential information that, although Arroway's recording device only recorded static, it recorded 18 hours of it. Arroway and Joss reunite, and Arroway receives ongoing financial support for the SETI program at the Very Large Array. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア(Wikipedia)』 ■ウィキペディアで「Contact (1997 American film)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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