Contact was released in 1997, directed by Robert Zemeckis and adapted from Carl Sagan's 1985 novel. Jodie Foster stars as SETI scientist Ellie Arroway, who detects a repeating signal from Vega, a star about 26 light years from Earth. The transmission's prime number pulses and later blueprints become the story's central mystery. Clips of the Vega message have since circulated among sci-fi fans online, reused in edits about SETI, alien communication and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence because the scene remains a grounded portrayal of first contact.