Steven Spielberg’s highly-anticipated DISCLOSURE DAY returns to the director’s long-standing fascination with outer space visitors to our planet. However, this is not a sequel to his CLOSE ENCOUNTER OF THE THIRD. Instead, DISCLOSURE DAY is a high-energy summer blockbuster action/thriller, that is more Roswell, UFOs (now called UAPs for “unidentified anomalous phenomena”), with a bit of alien autopsy, and related cover-up conspiracy theories, than “close encounters.” The aliens and spaceships are seen mostly seen in snippets of “old footage” that are part of the proof to be released. This action/thriller is about an effort to release this secret information that has been hidden for decades to the whole world, and those who are trying to stop that from happening.
DISCLOSURE DAY is thrilling as an exciting, entertaining action summer spectacular, with a breathless chase as the people determined to release that footage and proof to the world are pursed relentlessly by those who want it kept secret. Curiously, in this film, that is not the government but a secret private organization called WARDEX, which is connected the military, that has kept this secret information hidden for decades, while profiting from it.
As summer blockbuster entertainment, DISCLOSURE DAY has the goods. This grand chase is thrilling – outstanding really, pure big summer blockbuster stuff – although once they get to the end, some might find the ending less satisfying than one might hope after all the build-up. In some ways, DISCLOSURE DAY hearkens back to RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK more than “Close Encounters.”
Spielberg assembled his A team for this blockbuster, with music by the renowned John Williams and cinematography by two-time Academy Award winner Janusz Kaminski, who was director of photography for SCHINDLER’S LIST and SAVING PRIVATE RYAN. Production design is by Academy Award winner Adam Stockhausen (The Grand Budapest Hotel, Bridge of Spies). Director Spielberg wrote the story, which was adapted into a screenplay by his long-time collaborator David Koepp.
According to interviews, Spielberg acknowledges being a believer in outer-space alien visitors. He was inspired to make a movie revisiting that topic, and concerns about government secrecy, by a story in the New York Times in 2017, about the Defense Department funding a secret military intelligence program to investigate UAPs/UFOs, and article that ended with a quote from the former head of that program saying that such information never should have been kept from the public.
Surprisingly, in DISCLOSURE DAY, it is a private company, not the government, that is keeping the secrets. The thriller also touches on a number of science fiction ideas and conspiracy theories around UAPs/UFOs, all used to drive the action.
The film plunges into that action immediately, with an opening scene where Josh O’Connor’s character Daniel Kellner is attempting to ransom his kidnapped girlfriend Jane Blankenship (Eve Hewson). The kidnappers are from WARDEX and they want the information that their former employee, cybersecurity expert Kellner, took from them, along with a powerful alien object called the “device.” But Jane and Daniel escape with the information, and the pursuit begins.
WARDEX is led by Noah Scanlon (Colin Firth, playing against type), who is convinced that release of that information will have a devastating impact on the world, which is poised on the brink of WWIII. WARDEX is also profiting from this secret information, reverse-engineering outer-space technology, or at least trying to, in the case of the “device.” On the other hand, Kellner is aided by a group of ex-WARDEX people led by Hugo Wakefield (Colman Domingo), who are convinced that people have to right to know that alien visitors are real and are set on making sure the secret information is released.
Actually, there are two main characters in this action/thriller. One is Josh O’Connor’s Kellner and the other is a TV weather forecaster in Kansas City, Margaret Fairchild, played by Emily Blunt. Margaret is ambitious to move up into news reporting and thinking about moving to another city – again – to advance her career, much to the dismay of her partner Jackson (Wyatt Russell), a musician who has finally found success in KC. As they talk in their apartment that morning, something happens that releases surprising hidden powers in Margaret – powers like being able to read people’s thoughts or unconsciously speaking other languages, including the off-world one she suddenly starts speaking when on-air later that morning.
Cybersecurity whistle-blower Kellner and TV meteorologist Fairchild have never met but both experienced a childhood trauma that neither can clearly remember, a connection that plays a role as the story unfolds. The film alternates between Kellner and Fairchild for quite awhile although the threads eventually join. While Kellner focuses on eluding WARDEX and keeping his girlfriend safe, Fairchild focuses on figuring out her new abilities and exploring their meaning, as she follows intuitive impulses that seem to direct her.
This high-energy relentless chase creates a splendid summer entertainment thriller, as the shadowy WARDEX company tries to prevent the release of their trove of secret information about aliens and spaceship by the elusive Kellner and his hidden allies led by Colman Domingo’s Hugh Wakefield. There is one breathtaking action sequence after another, with only brief pauses between, where the characters discuss the public’s right to know and what impact that knowledge might have on people.
One particularly spectacular sequence involves a train, a piece of cinematic entertainment that is pure brilliance and so full of nerve-shattering excitement, that it seals the film’s place as a top-notch summer blockbuster, the kind of sequence that Spielberg does better than anyone else.
The structure is like a classic thriller, with strong echoes of Hitchcock’s NORTH BY NORTHWEST.
Like in Hitchcock’s films, not all the reasons for the chase stand up to close scrutiny because they are there mostly to motive the plot.
Spielberg also adds scenes between chase sequences that hint at wanting to insert some larger meaning into this action summer blockbuster but that has limited success there. Particularly, the film raises questions around religion, about whether the existence of life on other planets or of beings with god-like powers might be destabilizing to the world. A bigger question, why are the space visitors here, is dismissed by Colman Domingo’s ex-WARDEX Hugo, who asserts that the aliens are too evolved to be a threat to humankind.
The cast is excellent. Josh O’Connor is very strong in this heroic action role but it is Emily Blunt who really shines, in her performance as a women suddenly given unique powers. Colman Domingo is comforting and fatherly as the man directing the group of people who believe the secret information needs to be made public, while Colin Firth is chilling as the one willing to do anything to prevent its release. Firth does a great job as this character, who becomes increasingly unhinged and willing to take risks as the story unfolds.
As big action entertainment, DISCLOSURE DAY succeeds, although some viewers, like this writer, may find the film’s ending a bit of a letdown after all that build-up. However, as a film with something to say, it is less successful than it is as pure entertainment. Whether Spielberg really has something to say, or is just trying to add some depth to his epic entertainment, is not clear but Spielberg does spend some time raising questions about the impact that knowing visitors from outer-space have been here would have on people, particularly on people’s religion. That question is explored largely through Kellner’s Catholic girlfriend and a nun played by Elizabeth Marvel.
Opinions have been divided on this film. If you are looking for summer blockbuster entertainment, I would say Spielberg’s polished DISCLOSURE DAY is just the ticket. If you are looking for something more groundbreaking, or a film that revisits some of the deeper themes of Close Encounters, or one reveals something big at the end, this isn’t it.
DISCLOSURE DAY opens in theaters on Friday, June 12, 2026.
RATING: 3 out of 4 stars
