It’s been a while since I was able to bring up the betrayal which was…
Contact
… so here I go again.
The novel was thematically about one womans search for evidence of God’s existence.
As in the movie, they get the transmissions, she goes on her voyage (6 others are with her in the book, but don’t exist in the movie. No big deal, ya’ gotta cut a LOT with only 2 hours to tell the tale.) She comes back, subjective time on Earth is as shown in the novel, other than a bunch of static on her recording, there is no evidence the voyage even happens.
CUE END OF NOVEL: So there’s a govt inquest, the only evidence is the static, Ellie takes her lumps and, when done, programs her computer to figure out Pi to the n’th degree because her “father” said that’s where the evidence will be.
And she finds it. finis.
Really, the sort of ending one would expect from Sagan, a noted agnostic (if not atheist, but this isn’t the thread to quibble).
CUE END OF MOVIE: Govt inquest. Ellie bombarded by questions from Kitz, doesn’t have answers, finally comes up with a retort worthy of a 7th-grader on a message board “You have to take me on faith”. She walks out to an adoring audience, signs and all, “We believe you”, while Angela Basset reveals the not-so-shocking news that’s there is static on the tape which corresponds to the amount of time Ellie says she spent on the journey. FADE TO BLACK.
THE BETRAYAL: The book was about what it would take for a scientist to believe in a creator of the universe. Ellies father-alien said “we have found evidence of builders, here is how to find that same evidence.” Ellie goes out and finds it, but the book ends prior to her releasing it.
The movie was apparently about what it would take for a congressional enquiry to not charge you with crimes if you concocted some scheme which cost the governments billion$. The “evidence of God” issue… the central theme to the novel… was jettisoned for a cutesie line about “Well, I guess YOU have to take ME on faith, hyuck-hyuck”, with the adoring… and ignorant… masses falling behind Ellie as if she is a modern day Jesus.
So, the ending was changed. The character was changed. The theme, the central message of the novel, was not only ignored, it was, in fact, the opposite of Sagan’s intentions.
So Contact gets my vote here. At least the LOTR movies kept with the anti-industrialism/people are fucking cruel themes of the novels. At least Jaws kept the man vs nature conflict of the novel. At least The Firm kept the “your bosses aren’t looking out for your best intentions” subtext. But Contact? Naw, they f-ed with the central message of the book, made it completely different from Sagan’s intentions, and betrayed him and his work as a scientific-based, religious skeptic.