VERY curious to hear reactions to this movie. I had a blast but - hoo boy - I can imagine a lot of people hating it. It’s definitely not for the cynical or scientific-minded or anyone who doesn’t like syrupy, sappy Spielberg. From a production standpoint - acting, music, camera shots, editing - it felt just like watching Spielberg’s summer blockbusters of the past; he directs the hell out of it.
But the script definitely makes some interesting choices, and not everybody will go along with it. I’m not sure it’s a “love it or hate it” thing, but it’s certainly going to divide audiences.
My wife really wants to see this movie, and reserved us for Sunday a special two-person luxury seating box in some fancy theater that has, I don’t think quite IMAX-level quality, but some sort of extra wide screen super 4K laser projection LED crystal display or some such combo of keywords, one or two of which I think I remembered correctly.
There’s a LOT of Spielberg’s trademark “awed faces” in this movie, so you’re not wrong! People with a low tolerance for that stuff will not like this movie.
As a bit of a goddamn grouch I don’t care for his films. But I got to thinking about it and besides Duel (which I still think was brilliant) I will grudgingly concede having liked and/or admired: Raiders of the Lost Ark; Amistad; and Schindler’s List.
Peevish footnote: One thing I don’t like is Spielberg’s nearly always having to effectively break the fourth wall by winking at the audience, and even in Schindler he couldn’t stop himself: making the little girl’s coat red, in an otherwise entirely black and white film, was entirely unnecessary and yanked me out of the story. Briefly. But still.
To the OP and others who enjoy Spielberg: To each their own. Ignore the grouches and keep on enjoying.
And BTW, can we skip the whole Spielberg sucks thing? I think the thread is about this new movie, not whether the only good thing he ever directed was a TV movie from 1971.
I thought it was pretty underwhelming and frankly a bit boring. Some good scenes but as a whole not great. Too many scenes of characters making stupid decisions. I did get to go to a Q&A with Spielberg and Emily Blunt last night so that was cool.
Saw it yesterday. I’m lukewarm on Spielberg. I’ve liked some of his movies, thought others were stupid and/or insipid, so I had neither high nor low expectations. I enjoyed it, though. I liked it a lot more than Close Encounters. I liked Project Hail Mary more, but Disclosure Day was fun enough.
Saw the movie yesterday. I definitely agree with this part of the OP:
Yeah, it was a very watchable, well-directed, well-acted movie. Fast moving. Lots of edge-of-your-seat action. Fun sci-fi premise.
As for this part of the OP:
i didn’t have any problem with any of that, but I watched it as an entertaining movie. I didn’t take the science of it any more seriously than I take ‘Jaws’ as a ‘National Geographic’ style documentary on shark feeding and behavior patterns.
That said, I suppose the movie does raise an interesting question. Spoilers ahead, but the title is ‘Disclosure Day’ and I think everybody knows the movie is about aliens, so I don’t think it’s too much of a spoiler to say the movie’s central conflict is that the government has been hiding the existence of alien visitation on Earth for many years, and a rogue offshoot of the agency tasked to do the coverup decides that the world needs to know. So there is a question of which side is right and which is wrong-- does the world have a right to know, or will it panic and destabilize the world unnecessarily?
This being Spielberg, and again with the title-- the answer, of course, is: yes the world needs to know, and will know, and of course the aliens are unambiguously good and benevolent, and will possibly be the saviors of humanity, prizing empathy as the greatest virtue in the universe.
So that’s about as sappy and syrupy as it gets, but hey, it’s Spielberg-- you wouldn’t expect evil aliens, would you? Oh, and the thing about the aliens appearing as animals to the two main characters when they were kids, just to present as something less scary? If I’m a 10 year old kid and a giant antlered deer, a fox and a raccoon suddenly appear in my bedroom at night, I’m going to be every bit as freaked out as seeing aliens, if not more so.
Plothole-wise, I also wondered, if the aliens wanted to be discovered, it seems like they could have easily done so on their own long before, rather than having to work it though the two humans they gave alien powers to. And, when the actual disclosure took place live, I feel highly skeptical that, with the advent of AI, that the whole world would be able to confirm the alien videos as real and confirm the existence of aliens in real time like that.
But all in all, a fun way to spend almost 3 hours in the dark.
Well directed (as to be expected) but kind of boring. There was a core of a good movie there but this was not it. In the end this movie felt like it should have been the montage at the beginning of a different, better movie because the more interesting story is what comes next.
I have not seen it, but I read the wikipedia plot summary. Therefore I am qualified to comment.
I think this is the core issue: " In April 2024, it was reported that Spielberg’s next project would be a UFO film,". In no way is the plot description I read “a UFO film”. I wouldn’t even call CE3K a “UFO film”, and it had actual UFOs.
What does this film have? Intrigue, powerful government forces, secrets, lies, advanced tech, psychic powers, and normal individual citizens chosen to be the ambassadors to the future. Oh, my, sounds just like CE3K! A rerun!
