Disclosure Day is Steven Spielberg’s latest foray into the filmic exploration of aliens coming to Earth. This one feels a hell of a lot more grown up and less innocent than ET and far more tense than Close Encounters.
There are two protagonists in this flick – Daniel Kellner (Josh O’Connor), a cybersecurity expert turned whistleblower and Margaret Fairchild (Emily Blunt) a weather presenter on a local channel in Missouri. Both of them have a strange connection and seemingly ‘odd’ powers of understanding an influence over others.
Up against them is a shadowy organisation run by Noah Scanlon (Colin Firth) who is determined to stop them bringing the existence of aliens to the world’s attention.
From the very beginning this is a taut thriller with plenty of action. The story weaves competing notions of theology, greed, power and ultimately exposes the fear that underpins humanity’s existence. The government and military are obsessed with mistrust and opportunism around the discover of aliens and their technology and show no compassion towards anyone, human or extraterrestrial to further their aims.
The central premise seems to revolve around what morality is and the duality of human beings. We supposedly seek the truth, but end up creating divisions and lies in order to mask our fears and to gain power.
As with Spielberg’s earlier alien movies, this one seems to show extraterrestrials as being more evolved and full of benevolence and that maybe they are our savours. When combined with quite a bit of religious iconography and characters, it’s hard not to equate the aliens with god and religious salvation.
Perhaps I’m reading too much into that, but the concept of the ‘disclosure’ at the heart of the film relies on the intervention of beings greater than ourselves.
The film kept me interested in it all the way through and this is primarily because the cast were absolutely superb and their characters very compelling. It was easy to see them as real people and become captured by their relative desires and needs. Blunt and O’Connor in particular made you want to root for them.
The negative to the film is that it plays more as a villain chasing the goodies movie rather than a deep dive into the human condition and what an interaction with an alien race could really do to people. The chase scenes, particularly one involving a train, were adrenaline pumped but there was nothing new in this type of plot device and the impact was slightly undone by realising the two top billing stars were probably not going to be harmed.
For me this film brought up lots of questions about how we relate to one another and how our own fears and desires can affect our interactions with those around us. The aliens in this movie are literally from another planet, but they represent the inherent tribalism in humans and how we ‘other’ those who are not from our own community.
As a piece of entertainment, Disclosure Day is well worth a watch for its acting, its chases, and some of the mystery, but it doesn’t really quite get there in terms of satisfying a curiosity about aliens and what they might have to offer us.
DISCLOSURE DAY
Starring: Emily Blunt, Josh O’Connor, Colin Firth, Eve Hewson, Colman Domingo
Directed by: Steven Spielberg
Duration: 145 minutes
In New Zealand cinemas 11 June 2026
