Following in the footsteps of Close Encounters of the Third Kind and E.T., there’s a great film now playing in cinemas about mankind’s first contact with alien life, filled with an appropriate sense of wonder and intelligence. That film is Project Hail Mary. Then there’s Steven Spielberg‘s Disclosure Day, a spiritual successor to his earlier classics opening in Prague and cinemas worldwide this weekend, which is so preoccupied with telling the story of how the presence of alien life on Earth is revealed that it loses sight of the bigger picture: the presence of alien life on Earth.
Think of The Post, but instead of journalists at a Washington newspaper uncovering the Pentagon Papers, it’s a group of whistleblowers from shady government agency WARDEX bringing extensive evidence of 79 years of alien activity in the United States to light. As Disclosure Day opens, ex-WARDEX employee Daniel Kellner (Josh O’Connor) has made it to a professional wrestling match with a backpack full of flash drives, each one containing video proof of alien life from Roswell to Richard Nixon. Now he’s just got to upload them to YouTube, or Dropbox, and send a link to the team of whistleblowers led by Hugo Wakefield (Colman Domingo) he’s working with, and job done, right?
Only problem: WARDEX goons led by Noah Scanlon (Colin Firth) have kidnapped Daniel’s girlfriend Jane Blankenship (Eve Hewson), and demand a swap before he reveals the truth. But Daniel has a trick up his sleeve: he didn’t just swipe the flash drives, he also took a mysterious alien “weapon” that he threatens everyone with like a bomb. “Don’t shoot!” Scanlon orders, lest the thing, uh, detonate. He lets the young couple go without following in pursuit. Best to call it a workday and start again fresh tomorrow.
This opening sequence will be repeated for the remainder of Disclosure Day, as Daniel and Jane take it on the lam while the WARDEX men in black try to get their evidence back. You’re probably wondering why Daniel still doesn’t simply upload the material to the cloud, or what the alien weapon actually does, and why the bad guys don’t just kill these two. You might trust that David Koepp‘s screenplay has a good explanation for all of this and go along for the ride. It’s not like they’re sitting on this evidence until they can air it live on a local Kansas City television news broadcast.
Much more interesting is the story of Margaret Fairchild (Emily Blunt), a television meteorologist who begins developing mysterious telepathic abilities after an encounter with what appears to be an ordinary cardinal. Unlike the primary narrative thread, Margaret’s storyline has an emotional grounding that makes it consistently compelling as her newfound powers allow her to read minds—too bad for boyfriend Jackson (Wyatt Russell)—and gradually uncover buried memories connected to both her childhood and the extraterrestrial phenomenon at the heart of the film. Blunt’s character feels like a real person grappling with extraordinary circumstances rather than a screenwriter’s pawn being shuffled between plot points.
Throughout Disclosure Day, we never lose sight of the fact that these are ordinary people rather than superheroes. Even during the movie’s largest action sequences, the emphasis remains on the emotional consequences rather than the spectacle itself. Following one particularly intense train sequence, the film immediately pauses to allow Margaret to process a very real-feeling panic attack; it’s a small moment, but one that resonates more deeply than much of the action surrounding it.
The action itself is impressively staged and executed. An early car chase, the chaotic train collision, and a standout sequence inside a firehouse all showcase Spielberg’s masterful ability to stage large-scale set pieces with clarity and momentum. Yet there’s something frustratingly conventional about them; despite the extraterrestrial premise of the movie, the action scenes amount to little more than bad guys chasing good guys from one location to another.
Even as a disappointment, Disclosure Day remains undeniably entertaining. Spielberg’s filmmaking instincts remain remarkably sharp, and few directors working today possess his ability to guide viewers through complex action and emotional beats with such effortless confidence. The visual compositions are frequently striking, even if Janusz Kamiński’s cinematography often adopts the muted, murky aesthetic that has become commonplace in contemporary blockbusters. Pacing is also excellent; despite a lengthy runtime and a number of narrative frustrations, the film moves briskly and never loses the our attention.
Best of all is the score from 94-year-old John Williams, who lends an unmistakable warmth, excitement, and emotional texture to nearly every scene, elevating material that sometimes struggles on the page. There are echoes of his work on Star Wars, Indiana Jones, and Spielberg’s own science-fiction classics, but the score never feels nostalgic for nostalgia’s sake. Instead, it serves as a reminder of how much wonder Williams can still conjure after more than six decades of film composing.
One major technical quibble: the CGI animals. A cardinal, some deer, and most regrettably a fox appear throughout Disclosure Day, and each looks conspicuously artificial. While modern blockbusters increasingly rely on digital animals rather than live performers, the execution here falls below the standard audiences have come to expect. And why turn to animators for such mundane animal footage? If the low-budget European drama Hen can fill a 90-minute feature with consistently impressive scenes of real-life animals, why can’t Spielberg capture 15 seconds? Given that the narrative revolves around presenting the world with supposedly authentic evidence of alien life, there is a certain irony in the film’s presentation of obviously fake fauna.
While certainly not without interest, Disclosure Day is a missed opportunity from a filmmaker who has spent much of his career exploring humanity’s fascination with life beyond our world. Blunt’s affecting performance and Spielberg’s still-formidable skills make it easy to recommend to general audiences, but the film is too-often oddly fixated on the mechanics of disclosure rather than the implications of what is being disclosed. For a movie about the greatest revelation in human history, it’s surprisingly reluctant to look up at the stars.
One Response
Latest and maybe greatest example of the Steven Spielberg trope of unintentionally hilarious “hiding from trained pros” scenes. The hero is basically doing the worst hide and seek ever, often just standing in plain sight, while a whole team of supposedly competent agents just… don’t look in the obvious direction.
From the farmhouse chase to the cliff scene and even the hotel bit, it’s always the same thing: people are literally RIGHT THERE and nobody thinks to check behind them or turn around. It ends up feeling more like cartoon logic than an actual manhunt, you just end up going “they’re right there??” THEY ARE RIGHT THERE! TURN AROUND!