In a recent article, I wondered what would happen if we met aliens and they were not predators or imperialists, but actually more righteous beings than we are. What if the terrifying thing about extraterrestrial life was not that they wanted to destroy us, but that they were kinder, wiser, more truthful, and more loving than we imagined?
Steven Spielberg’s newest alien movie “Disclosure Day” begins with that premise and then builds a surprisingly religious sci-fi thriller around it. Josh O’Connor plays Daniel, a contractor who has fled a private defense operation with video proof of alien life and an alien artifact taken from the operation.
Emily Blunt plays Margaret, a weather reporter who can somehow channel the aliens and understand both where she needs to go and the inner needs of every person she meets. Colin Firth’s Noah represents the argument for secrecy: humanity is not ready, and if given access to alien knowledge, it will abuse it. He is also wounded by the loss of his own wife. Colman Domingo’s Hugo represents the counterclaim: truth doesn’t belong to a frightened organization, but to all people, who all deserve to know.
Spielberg wants to play with religious fire in this film.
Spielberg wants to play with religious fire in this film. He makes Daniel’s girlfriend a former nun and has her visit her former convent on several occasions. Hugo, in a speechy monologue, says the problem with the world is that we’ve lost our empathy. By contrast, we see that the nuns are always there to be supportive. And the aliens’ mind-manipulation technology is resisted through religious willpower. But rather than leaning into that as a solution, Spielberg seems to set up the aliens as a new kind of god.
Spielberg recognizes that most world religions would adapt more easily to the existence of extraterrestrial life than the secular imagination might assume. But he also suggests that having a superior being in front of us might challenge some religious assumptions. There are even scenes when Margaret, channeling the aliens’ powers, is worshipped. While Margaret rejects the veneration, the implication is not only that the aliens might be worshipped, but also that because they are so superior in their empathy, they might be worthy of it.
Spielberg is not contemptuous of religion here. But he does seem more interested in replacing it with alien compassion than deepening it. The result is a movie that invokes theology, while often settling for therapeutic awe.
The movie’s seriousness is sometimes undercut by its unknowing cheesiness.
But the ending works. And when disclosure finally happens, Spielberg finds the image the whole film has been driving toward. It is a much longer ending sequence than you would expect, but it is transporting. The television anchors’ reactions in the scene, captured in real time, are evocative and shockingly emotional. For a few minutes, the film stops telling us what disclosure means and starts letting us feel it instead.
“Disclosure Day” is not nearly as profound as it thinks it is, but it’s not shallow either. It manages to assemble a meaningful film from the alien mythology of the last 75 years. And for the most part, it sticks the landing. There is a good chance this film becomes the definitive version of that mythos.
Its deification of the aliens muddies its conclusions, and its gospel of empathy is too familiar to bear all the metaphysical weight Spielberg places on it. But as a movie about truth and love arriving together, as both a gift and a judgment, it has a real and haunting charge.
