Emily Blunt in Disclosure Day [Universal Studios]

DISCLOSURE DAY
Directed by Steven Spielberg
Certificate:
☆☆☆☆

WHEN you have made probably the two most impactful alien films in cinema history, coming back for a third sets up expectations.

And it is because of the weight of Close Encounters and ET, Steven Spielberg’s Disclosure Day feels unsatisfying.

It doesn’t mean this is a bad film – stylishly fast moving, well acted – but it simply isn’t a Close Encounters / ET for the modern day. There is no phoning home, no synth-based communications, and no Richard Dreyfuss crafting mountains out of mashed potato.

Instead, we get two story strands that draw on classic alien conspiracy tropes – that a crash at Roswell in 1947 was a visitation, and that many more have happened, all hushed up by a combination of the US’s military/industrial complex. Spielberg doesn’t aim his ire at the US government, but a private company – think the Black Rock model – led by shady bad guy Noah Scanlon (Colin Firth).

We meet Daniel Kellner (Josh O’Connor) as he steals alien programme secrets with the aim of telling the world. His motives are straightforward political points: that a) we need more empathy to face the climate crisis; that b) a military/industrial complex has been running the USA for decades; and c) we live in a post-truth landscape.

Chunky and timely stuff, but not done with much subtly.

Margaret (Emily Blunt) is a weather reporter for a Kansas City TV station. One morning a Cardinal bird flies in through her kitchen window and becomes a harbinger of some really, really weird happenings. It so transpires that Margaret and Daniel – playing the confused citizens role of Dreyfuss in Close Encounters – have been chosen to reveal the truth for reasons hidden in their past.

Disclosure Day plays on tropes – the aliens are based on Roswell’s little green men. The action scenes are preposterous. Our truth-tellers are chased by grunting, black-suited, shade-wearing men in high-powered cars. None of them can shoot or drive straight. Our heroes are basically being chased by a gang of toddlers playing blind man’s bluff.

Barack Obama joked the first thing he did after being inaugurated as President was ask the CIA where the aliens were kept. Spielberg offers an answer in a manner that feels fitting for a Trumpian America, drawing on conspiracies that extrapolate our unconscious anger at our tech-oligarch-run world.