I was at Devil’s Tower in 1976 with several friends who climbed it. (I watched them from below.) This was just after Close Encounters had finished filming there. There was still some evidence of the movie there, including big letters on the park headquarters building that said “Quarantine Camp” or something like that. At the time, we hadn’t heard of the movie.
Thanks for that! There seem to have been a whole bunch of different edits. I’m still a bit perplexed because I’m pretty sure I have an old DVD that was supposed to be the original theatrical edition and it doesn’t have that line in it. But at least I know I didn’t imagine it! It was a great line – too bad they cut it!
It’s a great film, and as someone posted upthread it has a rare sense of wonder about it.
My pet peeve is, given the various editions that are available, not one of them has excised this honkingly bad little exchange, just as the first returnees leave the mothership:
“So Einstein was right”
“Einstein was probably one of them”
Aaaargh
I used to be a big UFO buff. A guy I used to work with loaned me one of Vallee’s books and since then I’ve read several more. To me, his theories are more interesting than the “Extraterrestrial Hypothesis.”
CE3K is one of those rare dramas that have tension and a small sense of dread but also wonder and an optimistic view. I didn’t realize that Spielberg was largely responsible for the story.