Best Movies Like Arrival
After experiencing Arrival, are likely to find resonance in stories that questions the purpose and weight of our choices while ensuring targets the intellect with complex, multi-layered ideas. Carefully balances character depth with narrative flow makes this a compelling continuation of these themes.
Standard feature-length experiences.
Best for fans of who appreciate concise storytelling.
★ Top Picks
Solaris
A troubled psychologist is sent to investigate the crew of an isolated research station orbiting a bizarre planet.
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
An alien is left behind on Earth and saved by the 10-year-old Elliott who decides to keep him hidden in his home. While a task force hunts for the extra-terrestrial, Elliott, his brother, and his little sister Gertie form an emotional bond with their new friend, and try to help him find his way home.
The Philadelphia Experiment
Based on an "actual event" that took place in 1943. About a US Navy Destroyer Escort that disappeared from the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, and sent two men 40 years into the future to 1984.
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.
Her
In the not so distant future, Theodore, a lonely writer, purchases a newly developed operating system designed to meet the user's every need. To Theodore's surprise, a romantic relationship develops between him and his operating system. This unconventional love story blends science fiction and romance in a sweet tale that explores the nature of love and the ways that technology isolates and connects us all.
Moon
With only three weeks left in his three-year contract, Sam Bell is eager to return to Earth. Stationed alone at a Moon-based facility with his computer assistant GERTY, an unexpected accident sets off a series of unsettling events that shake his isolation.
Knowing
A teacher opens a time capsule that has been dug up at his son's elementary school; in it are some chilling predictions -- some that have already occurred and others that are about to -- that lead him to believe his family plays a role in the events that are about to unfold.
More Movies Like Arrival
Cosmos
Three astronomers accidentally intercept what they believe to be a signal from a distant alien civilization, but the truth is even more incredible than any of them could have imagined.
Time Freak
Stillman, a heartbroken physics student, builds a time machine when his girlfriend breaks up with him. Going back in time, he attempts to save their relationship by fixing every mistake he made—while dragging his best friend along in the process.
Mission to Mars
When the first manned mission to Mars meets with a catastrophic and mysterious disaster after reporting an unidentified structure, a rescue mission is launched to investigate the tragedy and bring back any survivors.
Mr. Nobody
Nemo Nobody leads an ordinary existence with his wife and 3 children; one day, he wakes up as a mortal centenarian in the year 2092.
The In Between
After surviving a car accident that took the life of her boyfriend, a teenage girl believes he's attempting to reconnect with her from the after world.
The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension
Adventurer/surgeon/rock musician Buckaroo Banzai and his band of men, the Hong Kong Cavaliers, take on evil alien invaders from the 8th dimension.
Escape from the Planet of the Apes
The world is shocked by the appearance of three talking chimpanzees, who arrived mysteriously in a spacecraft. Intrigued by their intelligence, humans use them for research - until the apes attempt to escape.
Star Trek: The Motion Picture
When an unidentified alien destroys three powerful Klingon cruisers, Captain James T. Kirk returns to the newly transformed U.S.S. Enterprise to take command.
Starman
When an alien takes the form of a young widow's husband and asks her to drive him from Wisconsin to Arizona, the government tries to stop them.
Paycheck
Michael Jennings is a genius who's hired – and paid handsomely – by high-tech firms to work on highly sensitive projects, after which his short-term memory is erased so he's incapable of breaching security. But at the end of a three-year job, he's told he isn't getting a paycheck and instead receives a mysterious envelope. In it are clues he must piece together to find out why he wasn't paid – and why he's now in hot water.
Babylon 5: The River of Souls
A group of Soul Hunters come to Babylon 5 demanding the return of something that was stolen from them.
Why These Movies Are Similar
These recommendations share core qualities with Arrival (2016): Drama and Science Fiction themes, similar narrative structure, and comparable emotional depth. NoBadPicks uses a combination of TMDB collaborative filtering, genre matching, and AI analysis to surface films most likely to resonate with fans of Arrival.
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