SPOILER ALERT: This article includes details about Steven Spielberg’s Disclosure Day.
There’s a scene in the final moments of Disclosure Day when Margaret Fairchild (Emily Blunt) sits behind a news desk, confident and ready to interrupt your regularly scheduled programming with a very special news report. In this case, it’s about aliens.
“This is disclosure day,” she says.
This was the moment I had been waiting for: the moment when a character in the movie says the title. The uttering of the title seemed so blatant that I felt that Emily Blunt was going to look into the camera and give us a wink and smile. I wanted to leap out of my seat in celebration. T
It all feels so… Spielbergian.
Disclosure Day is quintessential four-quadrant Steven Spielberg. The legendary director’s latest is a friendly reminder that his obsession with aliens, extraterrestrials, and otherworldly beings has not waned. Without a doubt, the film will draw comparisons to Spielberg’s extensive sci-fi oeuvre, specifically the vibes from his Close Encounters of the Third Kind era.
Close Encounters was Spielberg’s 1977 follow-up to Jaws, which is widely credited as the first modern blockbuster. Spielberg would follow suit with other fantastical and adventurous films, such as the Indiana Jones movies and Jurassic Park (1993).
Close Encounters was not a summer blockbuster, but it did earn Spielberg his first Oscar nomination. Spielberg did what many filmmakers can no longer do: struck a balance between popcorn blockbusters and prestige awards season contenders like The Color Purple (1985), Empire of the Sun (1987), and Schindler’s List (1993).
Disclosure Day leans heavily into summer blockbuster territory but has hints of award-season bait with big draws like Blunt, Colin Firth, Josh O’Connor, and Colman Domingo. It will draw in the numbers at the box office and has the essence of awards season flair — just like Close Encounters.
Disclosure Day feels familiar but in new packaging. Spielberg builds upon his strong foundation of childlike wonder, heartfelt (but not hokey) moments, and a fantastical sense of unlimited possibilities. He paints with his signature one-shot takes and multiple camera angles as if he were creating a new modern classic. Whereas Close Encounters had a five-note pattern that defined its place in pop culture, the robin, as the movie poster suggests, might be Disclosure Day’s contribution to the cultural zeitgeist. Not as exciting as the melodic trademark of Close Encounters, but it will do.
Another sci-fi feather in his cap, Disclosure Day feels is a fresh lens on Spielberg’s love of aliens. It doesn’t necessarily feel new, but it feels like it is so of-the-moment. It feels like a reminder of why we love movies — Spielberg is really good at that.
There is a Spielberg storytelling formula, but it’s a modular formula that works. He takes the simple premise of an ordinary person in extraordinary circumstances and fills in the blanks differently every time. Disclosure Day is a festival of ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances.
The bones feel the same not only as Close Encounters, but E.T. and Spielberg’s rendition of War of the Worlds. The stakes are high and the fate of the world and humankind rests on the shoulders of a meteorologist from Kansas City and the dude from Challengers.
In a time when cynical skepticism reigns supreme and cringe culture is avoided like the plague, it seems as though suspension of disbelief is not a thing anymore. Cinema requires you to give in to the world it represents — even if it includes a video footage of aliens hanging out with high-ranking officials from the U.S. government.
Disclosure Day is a flashy, Hollywood-glazed conspiracy movie about aliens with a glint of Spielbergian charm. The overt exposition-laden dialogue and over explanatory video footage is easily forgiven because the movie just made me feel good. The film succeeded in reigniting the kind of emotions I felt when watching E.T. or Jurassic Park for the first time. They are cinematic security blankets. Whether it is a friendly alien who loves Reese’s Pieces or an amusement park of dinosaurs that goes off the rails, Spielberg’s world of make-believe is… believable. There is part of you that wants to befriend an alien and/or being in a jeep with chased by a T. Rex with Jeff Goldblum in the backseat in real life. It’s the same for Disclosure Day. I wouldn’t necessarily want to live in that world, but I am glad to know that it can exist.
Between the wild alien hoopla and an all powerful otherworldly device that looks like it was purchased at House of Intuition on Melrose, Disclosure Day presents as an exciting sci-fi drama, but when it boils down to it, the film is a clear message of “let’s love one another.”
Spielberg folds in an assortment of belief systems to give the story tension. There’s Margaret and Daniel (Josh O’Connor), the clueless macguffins who are going on a journey. They serve as our guides. Meanwhile, Colin Firth is the hand-wringing corporate villain looking to track down Margaret and Daniel and exploit the alien powers they were granted. Daniel’s ex, Jane (Eve Hewson) represents the Catholic contingent while Colman Domingo’s mysterious, but knowledgable character Hugo can easily be mistaken for a “magical negro” trope (that’s a whole other conversation). These belief systems all collide at the pivotal “big reveal” and an ending that leaves you asking, “So what exactly was disclosed?”
Disclosure Day is quintessential Spielbergian summer movie fare, complete with aliens, existential crises, familial bonding, and, most of all, the numerous lateral tracking shots that I can’t get enough of. Besides Janusz Kaminski’s golden cinematography and the technical excellence Spielberg serves, Disclosure Day is an allegory of empathy.
The film literally shows the abuse of aliens by government officials, which hits too close to home. The capitalist greed and exploitation of power is all-too-familiar story. Like all good sci-fi, Disclosure Day puts modern-day issues on the screen in the form of fantasy. Spielberg knows how to unpack and translate these issues on the screen with cinematic flair and approachable artistry. He doesn’t simplify. He meets the audience where they are.
Disclosure Day is no Close Encounters because we’ve been there already. However, Close Encounters gave us a wide-eyed perspective on humankind’s relationship with the cosmos, while Disclosure Day is injected with a healthy dose of curious, yet cautious suspicion.
He focuses on asking the audience to be open-minded to the world and beyond. He focuses on building community and connecting with the people surrounding them. Instead of fighting someone and judging them, be like Margaret: look into their soul and tell them a deep, emotional secret that will disarm them in the most arresting way possible.
Spielberg doesn’t reinvent the UFO with Disclosure Day. He’s simply continuing to find the truth, because like The X-Files told us… the truth is out there.
