Story by Steven Spielberg
Screenplay Written by David Koepp
Directed by Steven Spielberg
**** (four stars)
RATED PG 13
RUNNING TIME: 2 hrs 30 min
This is one that I feel the need to sit with...
The year 1977, in which I was only 8 years old, was the year that I became fully aware and completely fell in love with the art and artistry of the movies. For so many people like myself, I am certain that both George Lucas and Steven Spielberg were the figures responsible for this cinematic awakening. As I reflect, what I find remarkable is how my memories of those experiences have existed for me.
With Lucas' "Star Wars" (1977), which I saw on the very first day, my recollections are and remain s vivid that they are practically blinding. I can very easily place myself back at the River Oaks movie theater just outside of Chicago in Calumet City, being engulfed by the sound and vision presented in 70MM widescreen and Dolby sound, and further fully transformed emotionally by all that I had witnessed. It was unquestionably a stark before/after life experience never to be forgotten.
Now...with Spielberg's "Close Encounters Of The Third Kind" (1977), my memories are hazier. My interest in astronomy, space and whatever existed out there beyond Earth was certainly a draw. But, even so, I do not quite remember whether I saw the film at the aforementioned River Oaks or at the Evergreen Plaza theater near my home at the time. Where I could remember every single moment from "Star Wars," my memories of Spielberg's film are relegated to specific scenes and moments as the film felt pitched towards more adult sensibilities despite its explicit childlike wonder and awe. While scene to scene and certain concepts were beyond my 8 year old comprehension, the sheer impact of the experience in totality was equally as soul shifting as what Lucas achieved.
I remember my introduction to what I have ever since referred to as "Spielberg lights," scenes where mist, dust or other airborne moisture creates vibrant beams of light from flashlights, almost as if they could be real world lightsabers. I was absolutely dazzled by the otherwise terrifying sequence of 5 year old Barry (Cary Guffey), alien abduction, punctuated by his opening of the door to his home to view a flooding of yellow and orange light augmented by an ominous sound. I even vividly remember a moment during a council meeting sequence where an older gentlemen exclaimed that "I saw Bigfoot once!"
Most of all, as blue collar everyman Roy Neary, Richard Dreyfuss was magnetic, perfectly encapsulating both adult and child like sensibilities. From the moment what appears to be car headlights behind him rising upwards into the night skies to his bewilderment at momentarily being bathed in white light on a darkened Indiana railroad crossing. His gradual descent into perceived madness while being consumed by visions of Devil's Tower, which he attempts to reconstruct through drawings, mashed potatoes and a large scaled replica via dirt, bricks and house debris. His distinct need to find answers. I was ready to follow him everywhere including and even further than the film's majestic climax of contact and communication orchestrated through kaleidoscopic colors, sounds, those iconic five musical notes and the pure, primal wellspring of emotion that could have levitated me.
By the time of Spielberg's "E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial" (1982), he was already my favorite Director, ad that film, an exquisite jewel of a portrait of loneliness and friendship, is so perfect that to this day, it remains my favorite film, which I have only seen three times in my life.
Now, Steven Spielberg arrives with what definitely feels to be the third conceptual piece to themes he has explored over the course of his vast 5 decade plus career, his 35th film, "Disclosure Day."
So as to not inadvertently produce spoilers, I will keep the plot description to the basics. Steven Spielberg's "Disclosure Day," set in the present rather than the Director's penchant for setting his stories either within the past or the future, finds the world on the brink of nuclear holocaust. Josh O'Connor stars as cybersecurity specialist Dr. Daniel Kellner on the run--with his girlfriend, a former nun Jane Blankenship (Eve Hewson)--from his employer, a clandestine government organization knows as the Wardex Corporation as led by CEO Noah Scanlon (Colin Firth), for the theft of hard drives containing evidence of extraterrestrial contact throughout the decades and also, an alien artifact.
Meanwhile in Kansas City, local news meteorologist Margaret Fairchild (Emily Blunt) suddenly begins to experience a psychic ability after an appearance of a cardinal in her kitchen. After several inexplicable moments of intuition, perception and the ability to speak and understand foreign languages of which she had previously no knowledge of, Margaret experiences a moment on live television during which she is stricken with the power of speaking through what sounds like a series of guttural clicks, thus alerting the attention of the Wardex Corporation, who are soon in pursuit of her.
As these respective trajectories converge, we are also introduced to Hugo Wakefield (Coleman Domingo), a former Wardex employee leading a team of rogue employees who are guiding both Daniel and Margaret to what is planned as the titular "disclosure day," the moment when all will be revealed to the world at large.
Steven Spielberg's "Disclosure Day" is a superbly stirring experience, expertly showcasing that alongside his most recent cinematic triumphs of both his outstanding "West Side Story" (2021) and his sublime autobiographical document "The Fablemans" (2022), he, at nearly 80 years old, has not lost even one, solitary step as he remains as enamored with the process and the art of cinematic storytelling as he was in his younger days. As what we would expect from Spielberg, this is an elegant production--again aided superlatively by key collaborators Cinematographer Janusz Kaminski and Composer John Williams--that brilliantly blends the visceral (a sequence with a speeding train is as breathless as anything Spielberg has ever conceived) and the cerebral into a defiantly uncynical and surprisingly upending presentation that wisely illustrates how sometimes the most complex answers rest in what is seemingly the most simplistic.
I honestly cannot think of a time during a Steven Spielberg film when I did not feel necessarily grounded. As with every Indiana Jones adventure, "Disclosure Day" opens with what would essentially be the third act of any other motion picture but unlike Indiana Jones, Spielberg deliberately keeps us off balance for the majority of the film, leaving us in a similarity precarious state of mind as the characters of Daniel Kellner, Jane Blankenship and most crucially, Margaret Fairchild. Each of these characters, just as all of us within the audience, are questioning what exactly is happening simultaneously within each of themselves, the world and the nature of existence and how they all intersect and therefore, connect.
While this tactic may be detrimental in another film, the effect here is as unnerving as it is thrilling as Spielberg has essentially created a chase movie yet the directions and end results are not being spoon fed to us or the characters, as we are possibly learning at the same rate as the characters themselves. To that end, much should be made of Emily Blunt's truly demanding, startling performance which is an amalgamation of confusion, wisdom, humor, a taste of schizophrenia and the holding of a mirror to us in the audience. It is as if she is existing within some odd liminal space and I honestly do not know how she pulled that off!
Throughout "Disclosure Day," we are all unsure as to the motivations, the agendas, the allegiances and alliances, again keep everyone consistently off balance. The further the film unfolds, we gradually understand how the disparate pieces connect, all leading to the film's controversial yet astounding climax--magically anchored by former news journalist Courtney Grace's bracing performance-which might be more than underwhelming for some viewers but for me catapulted me back to similar emotions I experienced when I first saw each of "Close Encounters Of The Third Kind" and "E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial" those very first times.
As previously stated, Steven Spielberg's "Disclosure Day" is a defiantly uncynical film and in its own way, perhaps even more than Phil Lord and Christopher Miller's beautiful "Project Hail Mary" from earlier this year, as it is a film that is ultimately speaking directly to this specific moment in our collective world culture and history when it is feeling that our own worst, basest instincts are rapidly hurtling us towards our own extinction...and for what?
"Disclosure Day" is innocently and profoundly asking of its characters and us, what does it mean to be human? What does it mean to not only exist but to co-exist and what is our existence if it only encompasses the things that we can see, hear and touch in our immediate material world or solely through our own individualistic perceptions? And furthermore, what is existence and does it only involve all that we have been told and instructed to believe? Does our idea of existence only hold what feels possible for no other reason than we have brains that are indeed only human?
I believe that with this film, and frankly throughout his entire filmography, Steven Spielberg is expressing that not do we have the capability to hold what is tangible and what is possible within our very human brains, that it is essential for whatever progression we hope to have within our shared humanity and interconnectivity with the world and beyond. For over and again vis his films and unquestionably with "Disclosure Day," Spielberg, one of our most empathetic filmmakers, implores of us to just take the time to...listen. This may feel to be an oddly facile concept to swallow but again, "Disclosure Day" rests in this unusual space of being an adult film based within its own innocence. It is a hopeful film which unveils itself with the backdrop of an impending nuclear annihilation.
To that end, to me, "Disclosure Day" exists as a plea.
In my everyday real world life as a preschool teacher, and especially this year as it has presented itself as the most difficult, straiting, stressful, disheartening year in my entire nearly 30 year career, I am faced with a roomful of 3 year old children existing in various states of emotional dysregulation, anxieties, anger, and violent outbursts. And as I am trying to instill in them the tools of naming emotions, building an emotional vocabulary, and recognizing empathy by beginning to understand that they are co-existing in a space with other people than themselves, a constant refrain I share with the children happens to be the following;
"Please listen...it's hard when you do not listen."
This is a sentiment that grows in importance and weight with me as I have grown older as I realize how powerful it is despite how simplistic it sounds. That when we each lead with our own sense of self-importance and self-preservation, that when we lead with our own sense of narcissism, that when we lead with our unwillingness to entertain a perspective different than our own for we are adhered unshakably to our own sense of rightness. When we lead with arrogance, recrimination, regret, grief, fear, anxiety and everything that seemingly rejects the core truth of what empathy is, we are only dooming ourselves, individually and collectively.
In Steven Spielberg's "Disclosure Day," the concept of listening is something I think Spielberg is addressing upon multi-levels. To the story he is telling, definitely. With our interpersonal relationships and symbiotic nature with existence, certainly. Because we are being asked to not solely listen to people who are different than ourselves. But to also, listen closely to our hearts, our souls, to the environment and all that live within it. To listen to the nature of possibility itself, because honestly, how could the infinite expansion of existence only contain us within it?
But, additionally, in some ways, I am also wondering if Steven Spielberg is using "Disclosure Day" to also address our relationship with the movies themselves.
Yes, I understand how for some viewers of the film, the climax could be read as being somewhat anti-climactic. Perhaps that perception is not exactly the relative fault of the film itself. Perhaps it is representative of the fact that we as a society have long been conditioned to the cataclysmic, theater wall shaking conclusions filled with bombastic special effects driven fire and brimstone and one ending after another. Essentially the type of film experience Spielberg himself altered the entire film industry with over 50 years ago in "Jaws" (1975).
Yet, Steven Spielberg has always existed as a filmmaker more thoughtful than simply throwing carnivalesque events at audiences just for the sake of doing so, and honestly, what most major film releases have ultimately become. For me, the climax of "Disclosure Day" was especially gripping, solidifying and uplifting the whole experience and in its own way, the entire film felt like a bookend to "The Fablemans."
With "Disclosure Day," we witness Spielberg, lifelong champion of the cinematic arts and the movie theater going experience unveiling a film within our overly distracted age where movies are treated more disposably than ever, attention spans being shorter (I personally cannot stand the constant complaints about movie running times as if movies cannot end fast enough just to get the viewer onto the next thing instead of having the film itself as the full experience), and media literacy nose diving rapidly, literally imploring of us to just LISTEN. To LISTEN to our spirit and just allow ourselves to surrender and get caught up and be swept away in a dream for two and a half hours with a room full of strangers experiencing the exact same dream and then...let's just see how the dream affects us all.
We have been conditioned to viewing the movies as fast food for so long now that the movie going experience as a cultural event doesn't feel to mean as much anymore. Perhaps the respective journeys of the characters within the story of "Disclosure Day," especially Emily Blunt's Margaret Fairchild, one could argue, are designed as a means to mirror our relationship with the movies and to think and remember that very first movie that made an impression and sent each of us upon our own journeys within cinema. Just as how "Star Wars" and "Close Encounters Of The Third Kind" forever altered the course of my life. Frankly, I would not be here writing about films right now if not for those two movies.
Maybe this is one reason why I felt so off balance during the majority of "Disclosure Day" because the film almost functions as if it is a dream. This is not to express that there are no more movies being made in the 21st century that people are not experiencing, becoming involved with and are passionate about. It's that the movie going experience has been diluted and fragmented to the point where we are conditioned to see something, offer a "hot take" and then, forget about it forever...instead of living with it, thinking about it, and possibly emerging from the experience feeling different about the world compared to the moments before you saw whichever movie it was.
That inexplicable before and after...
Steven Spielberg's "Disclosure Day" is a film that rests within the pivotal moments between the before and the after, the wrestling that occurs with quandary of remaining just as you have been or walking into the unknown, the uncharted territory, the feeling of danger that resides in not being in control anymore...if you ever really were. For nearly 50 years of my life, Steven Spielberg has proven himself to existing as the best guide into the unknown that I could wish for.
"Disclosure Day" is another excellent step further.
