Gallery: How Arrival's Designers Crafted a Mesmerizing Alien Alphabet

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    Jan Thijs/Paramount Pictures
    01

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    In Denis Villeneuve's *Arrival*, Amy Adams plays a linguist trying to communicate with alien visitors.
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    Jan Thijs/Paramount Pictures
    02

    Arrival5.jpg

    The aliens, or Heptapods, speak in indecipherable clicks. So Louise Banks (Adams) begins documenting and analyzing their written language, which looks like coffee mug stains with protruding tarantula legs.
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    Jan Thijs/Paramount Pictures
    03

    Arrival4.jpg

    Patrice Vermette is the designer who created the logogram language, with help from his wife, artist Martine Bertrand.
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    Jan Thijs/Paramount Pictures
    04

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    Vermette always knew the alien language would appear in circles—*Arrival* screenwriter Eric Heisserer specified so in the script. The trick was creating something that wouldn't register as human, but that could follow some set of rules.
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