Spielberg works with people he’s trusted: a John Williams score, Janusz Kaminski cinematography, a David Koepp screenplay. Disclosure Day has no jaw dropping moments, no fear or dread and lacks bewilderment and wonder.
It’s just a popcorn movie at least 30 years too late because of the day and age we now live.
Old-fashioned ideas are stuck back in the ’70s.
There’s a similar plot and characters to Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), characters possessed of some superior knowledge that drives them nuts.
Disclosure Day reverts to elements of Spielberg’s back catalogue: E.T. (The Extra-Terrestrial) (1982), Close Encounters (1977), and A.I. (Artificial Intelligence) 2001, even his TV movie debut Duel (1971).
Simultaneously, this familiarity with alien themes from Spielberg’s past movies may be just what viewers want.
The audience in the theatre was most appreciative of the film.
Writer David Koepp from Pewaukee, Wisconsin has devised some excellent screenplays for Spielberg including adaptations of Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park (1993) and The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997).
He’s also come up with stinkers like Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008) and Jurassic Park Rebirth (2025).
Forty-two drafts were required for Disclosure Day.
It still underwhelms and is not genre defining.
The score by elder statesman, the reliable John Williams isn’t memorable, has no particular thematic quality as in Jaws (1975) and earlier Spielberg collaborations.
However, at the start of the end credits of Disclosure Day the music strongly pays homage to the X-Files TV drama theme.
One positive is that it’s an action film about empathy.
Emily Blunt is Margaret Fairchild, (named for Koepp’s Mum) a Kansas City TV Weather Anchor who encounters an exotic bird.
She has power to speak and understand any language, appears to almost read peoples’ minds, knows exactly what they’re thinking and how they’re feeling.
She’s the most profound empathetic person in the story. Empathy is her superpower.
Empathy today, especially in the United States, is under attack, seen as a weakness by a lot of noisy and wealthy people, naming names unneeded.
Whenever aliens land, be they good ones, or baddies as in Spielberg’s re-imagination of War of the Worlds (2005), it’s usually in the United States.
Aren’t we glad we live in Australia.
Dr Daniel Kellner (Josh O’Connor) is a nerdy cyber specialist on the run from authorities.
He has information saved on USBs of alien landings, stuff the government keeps from public eyes and ears.
There is a two-car and train sequence referencing Duel which is absolutely nail biting.
Under Spielberg’s direction all chases and standoffs are tense.
Hugo Wakefield (Colman Domingo) is a disclosure advocate, a puppeteer, the Steven Spielberg on the screen.
As Margaret Fairfield notes, “He’s the man who knows everything.”
Being a race for information story, Noah Scanlon (deeply bearded and weird Colin Firth) is the chief antagonist, the head of a shadowy company whose purpose is to suppress the truth about extraterrestrial life.
Scanlon believes humanity is too unstable and fearful to handle the reality of intelligent alien life… and he lacks empathy.
This introduces a discussion: If aliens are discovered on earth, might this make world religions have an existential meltdown?
It’s an idea effectively discussed in Contact (1997).
Kellner and Fairchild have an object received through alien contact, a thing passed around which brings out near-supernatural powers.
It comes across as a Harry Potter wand.
Animals were digital and shonky, but the reason might be because the bodies are inhabited by aliens.
No. In a big budget picture, animals should have moved naturally, as dinosaurs can in all the Jurassic Park movies.
Spielberg’s latest entry with its jumbled screenplay is no world-beater, but it will entertain if you enjoyed his past alien fantasies.
