Disclosure Day (Steven Spielberg, 2026)

[aox]

I think it's his best movie since 2005. It's imperfect, but I was able to forgive those issues in favor of its intriguing narrative design

Bridge of Spies is kind of unfuckwithable, but I'll take the endorsement.

EDIT: I'm also a fan of Lincoln and The Post, though imperfect.

[therewillbeblus]

I like Bridge of Spies too!

[John Cope]

War Horse.

[therewillbeblus]

I should clarify that I like most Spielberg a fair amount (I can probably count on one hand the movies of his that I actively dislike), but also think this is his best work in decades

[beamish14]

I’m surprised that no one else has mentioned Tintin, which I still think is handily his best post-A.I. work

[The Curious Sofa]

Like other live-action directors, Spielberg resented the slowness and lack of control over the animation process when making Tintin. As a result design and motion sat uneasily between live action and animation, and it was a mistake to go down the motion capture route. It's as bad as when Zemeckis wasted the best part of a decade on his dead-eyed motion capture projects.

Spielberg's output always went through ebbs and flows and A.I. revitalised his career; Minority Report, Catch Me If You Can, War of the Worlds and Munich are all great films. More recently, West Side Story and The Fabelmans were excellent. Lincoln, Bridge of Spies and The Post are respectable films I don't feel particularly enthusiastic about. There are a few films of his I skipped (Amistad, War Horse, Hook, The Terminal, The BFG) and the only one where I didn't make it to the end as I hated it so much is Always.

There are lots of updated rankings of his films online now, and I seem to like The Sugarland Express much more than most people do. Close Encounters of the Third Kind is still my favourite of his films. It had the same effect on me as Star Wars had on other kids my age. I was obsessed with it at the time and went to see it at the cinema about ten times (this was when successful films were still in cinemas for months, sometimes years). Unlike Star Wars, Close Encounters puts its special effects magic in a human context: take out the UFOs and it's a New Hollywood film about a working-class man having a mental breakdown and losing his family as a result, a sort of male equivalent of Woman Under the Influence.

[beamish14]

There are a few films of his I skipped (Amistad, War Horse, Hook, The Terminal, The BFG) and the only one where I didn't make it to the end as I hated it so much is Always.

Always has some truly astounding cinematography in it (like Andrzej Bartkowiak, Mikael Salomon never should’ve quit that vocation to become a director), but it doesn’t infuriate and outright offend me the way The Color Purple does

[beamish14]

Returning to this film, I think it features one of the single dumbest moments in any of his films with the car falling into a ravine and the Keystone Cops being unable to find our heroes

The film made me think about Paul Schrader’s draft of what became Close Encounters, which leaned heavily into Christian iconography/the messianic significance of extraterrestrial visitation. He probably could’ve done more with the basic premise of this film for at least 1/20th of the budget

[hanshotfirst1138]

This is a bit of Spielberg Greatest Hits package. It's not bad, but overall, it's a bit too long. There's some of his usual warmth and humanity as well as a few set pieces that are skillfully orchestrated, but this stuff is well-worn, even in weaker movies like Signs and Knowing. The evangelism and the parallels it purports to draw are a little much. Great performances, as always, rather weak plotting.

[Tuco]

Mash together CLOSE ENCOUNTERS, ET (and a touch of DUEL), throw it at the wall and see what sticks. Certainly not his best, certainly not his worst. But I love JAWS, and EMPIRE OF THE SUN is one I keep coming back to...and I'd like to upgrade my old DVD of RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK to 4K, but there's a lot of other stuff out there.

[bearcuborg]

There's a lot to unpack with this film...I'd love to know what someone like Joseph McBride thinks of Disclosure Day.

I found this somewhere between too light to be a serious film, but perhaps too serious to be a light science fiction blockbuster. But hey, it is 2026 and I feel pretty grateful to still be getting Spielberg/Kaminski/Williams collaborations! I really liked the POV of the wrestling boot on the lens in the beginning. There were some cinematic high points, and enough jokes/John Williams shtick to make me enjoy every minute, even if I rolled my eyes here and there…

In many ways Disclosure Day is a more deeply personal film than The Fablemans. The last line was the purpose of the whole movie-mixed up with his usual movie stylings-for better or worse. I won’t deny it’s naive and childlike-but in a nutshell I think I understood what he was trying to say.


I took the Hugo character representing Steven’s interest in filmmaking as sort of an answer to his personal issues of childhood trauma, and our place in the universe. His parents were again represented with mathematics and music. A lot of times I view movies like this as spending time with the filmmaker. I just enjoy Steven’s company…I definitely saw some Hitchcock love in this one. I can't say I thought much about Emily Blunt, but she did a fabulous job here.

Spoiler

The audio of the alien torture was a bit ghastly. A dig at those ridiculous alien autopsy shows from the 90s? Some of the archival alien footage reminded me of holocaust films. Also, I wish someone was rebuilding my childhood home with all my old toys in there…