Reviews and Comments by Ken Burke
I invite you to join me on a regular basis to see how my responses to current cinematic offerings compare to the critical establishment, which I’ll refer to as either the CCAL (Collective Critics at Large) if they’re supportive or the OCCU (Often Cranky Critics Universe) when they go negative. However, due to COVID concerns I’m mostly addressing streaming options with limited visits to theaters, where I don’t think I’ve missed much anyway, but better options are on the horizon. (Note: Anything in bold blue below [or near purple] is a link to something in the above title or the review.)
My reviews’ premise: “You can’t please everyone, so you got to please yourself.”
(from "Garden Party" by Rick Nelson and the Stone Canyon Band, 1972 album of the song’s name)
However, if you’d like to know more about rationale of my ratings visit this explanatory site.
Here’s the trailer:
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If you can abide plot spoilers read on, but this blog’s intended for those who’ve seen the film or want to save some $ (as well as recognizing those readers like me who just aren’t that tech-savvy). To help any of you who want to learn more details yet avoid these all-important plot-reveals I’ll identify any give-away sentences/sentence-clusters with colors plus arrows:
⇒The first and last words will be noted with arrows and red.⇐ OK, now continue on if you prefer.
WHAT HAPPENS: (There’s a lot more plot happening in this film than I can encapsulate in what I intend as a reasonably-brief summary, so for more details, along with extensive background info, please go here.) Disclosure Day presents us with 2 related narrative lines which eventually intersect, but first we must hustle to keep up with them as the editing takes us frequently from one to the other. U.S. cybersecurity specialist Dr. Daniel Kellner (Josh O’Connor) worked for a secret agency, the Wardex Corp., headed by Noah Scanlon (Colin Firth), in league with our American government, but now he’s gone rogue, stealing a bunch of flashdrives with (what we later learn is) clear evidence of U.S. awareness of extraterrestrial encounters with our planet, dating back to the Roswell, NM crash of an alien spaceship in 1947. Scanlon’s team captures Daniel’s lover, Jane Blankenship (Eve Hewson), for a trade with Daniel for his devices, but one not in his backpack is a powerful thing from outer space which Daniel uses to allow him and Jane to escape, then they take shelter in a convent where Jane once was in the process of becoming a nun. Another aspect of Daniel’s story involves phone calls he gets from Hugo Wakefield (Colman Domingo)—whoever he is—trying to help Daniel avoid capture (we also later learn Hugo was once part of Wardex's coverups.
The other major plot line involves Margaret Fairchild (Emily Blunt), a meteorologist for a Kansas City, MO TV station who’s been feeling ill at ease lately with no clear explanation. On the day of her next weather report she suddenly starts speaking strangely (yet another later revelation is her supposed gibberish is actually an alien language which Daniel, but no one else, can understand). Her lover, Jackson (Wyatt Russell), rushes her to the hospital where she realizes a couple of supposed FBI agents are actually with Wardex so she slips out, drives away with Jackson but slips away at a gas station, driving off on her own. Back to Daniel and Jane where Scanlon uses his command of one of those alien devices to telepathically interact with Jane, commanding her to kill Daniel; however, she resists, they hole up in a rural motel where Wardex finds them so Daniel lets himself be captured, sends Jane away with his alien device. Margaret makes a psychic connection with Daniel, uses her version of Jedi mind control to free him, but as they drive away they’re chased by a Wardex guy who pushes their car into the path of an oncoming train with their adrenalin-fueled actions allowing them to survive once again after a marvelously-excruciating scene involving another speeding train. ⇒Margaret and David meet up with Hugo who helps them recover suppressed memories of how aliens visited them as young children, gave them powers which only manifested as adults, They all go back to Margaret’s TV station to broadcast the truth about the aliens, only for Scanlon showing up to turn off the power. Jane’s there, though, to give Daniel’s alien device to Margaret so she can take full control of her “Disclosure Day” broadcast, supported by Daniel’s stolen videos, the broadcast taken up by all other networks, providing global exposure. Then Hugo’s team bring out a live alien who says something to Daniel which he relays to Margaret, simply the word “Listen”⇐ as it ends.
SO WHAT? For the second week in a row for this blog Nina and I went to a local theater in conscious defiance of our ongoing COVID concerns to see something in current release, figuring we wouldn’t encounter much of a crowd during an early afternoon matinee on a weekday for a film now into it’s 5th week. As things worked out, my biggest surprise was that Disclosure Day is still playing at this location because we had an approximately 500 seat auditorium all to ourselves, so no COVID worries at all. (Unless this virus or anything similar goes on another rampage we’ll probably keep using this strategy at least while the weather’s warm—which it certainly is in the San Francisco Bay area this week, yet our unusual temps are still cooler than much of the U.S. that’s currently baking under some brutal numbers, just like much of Europe’s had to endure recently. Oh, this is supposed to be a film review!) Sorry, back to the subject at hand. I’ll admit Disclosure Day’s a bit hard to follow during its first half as we understand Daniel, Jane, and Margaret are under extreme physical duress from some publicly-unknown quasi-government agency, but it’s (intentionally) unclear what Daniel’s carrying around in that precious backpack and what in the world (or beyond) is going on with Margaret’s ability to suddenly have clarity on the situations of strangers; further, we have little sense of what those strange devices are both Daniel and Noah possess, what provides their metaphysical power, or how anyone who ends up in a car with Daniel can manage to survive into the next scene when everything from carloads of creeps to a rapidly-oncoming train is hurled at them.
But once we learn how this is all an extreme clandestine coverup of decades of U.S. secret awareness of extraterrestrial encounters than it all quickly falls into place, given what we know of Spielberg’s previous stories about such beings—Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982), Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008)—where our official leaders are much more of a problem where such creatures are concerned than are the aliens. Once we’re clear on what this film’s truly about it moves swiftly, effectively to the dramatic conclusion where Margaret and Daniel are finally able to accomplish the goal they’d been seeking all along. It may be a little frustrating to attempt to follow what’s happening in this film’s early scenes, but I encourage you to hang in there, if nothing else appreciate the masterful filmmaking that moves this story along enhanced by excellent acting from Blunt, O’Connor, Firth, and Domingo even when we don’t fully know who they are, what their motivations may be, or how this all must come together.
BOTTOM LINE FINAL COMMENTS: Disclosure Day opened on June 12, 2026 in 3.824 domestic (U.S.-Canada) theaters (still in 2,204), so far has grossed $111.5 million ($229.1 million worldwide), so it’s not yet available in streaming although this site may provide some help in buying tickets. The CCAL's generally supportive, either now on the big screen or latter in your home environment: Rotten Tomatoes positive reviews at 80%, the Metacritic average score at (a closer than usual) 74%. Given that I rarely go above 4 stars in my ratings (saving 4½ and 5 for truly monumental works) when I say 4 stars it’s somewhat like unto those who’d opt for 100%, given that they’re evaluating on a scale of what’s available now whereas I’m also factoring in the larger history of cinema so a 5 from me would need to be assigned to something in the realm of The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola, 1972). With that understanding in mind, I’ll cite in grand support of this current film an MC 100%-er, Odie Henderson of the Boston Globe: “Much has been made about the director’s ‘return to movies about aliens.’ The marketing of ‘Disclosure Day’ leads the audience to expect a movie they’re not going to get. The film’s cryptic ending reminded me, oddly enough, of the last scene in Spike Lee’s 1988 movie, ‘School Daze.’ In that film, Laurence Fishburne runs through an HBCU’s campus in a slow motion dream sequence while repeating a phrase that is Lee’s message to the viewer. This does not resolve any of the film’s plotlines, so audiences found it infuriating. [¶] Spielberg delivers his final message in a similar manner, though his version is even more dreamlike and potentially alienating. For this reason, I think ‘Disclosure Day’ will be divisive as hell. I loved it, because this thrilling film is all about its questions, not its answers. That is the mark of a true elder statesman’s wisdom.” Thus, don't expect any aliens within this film to try phoning home.
As always, though, I can easily find alternative voices who aren’t so thrilled, such as one from “across the pond,” Robbie Collin (MC 40), in U.K.’s The Telegraph: “The result feels oddly empty and, for all its surface-level convolutions, derivative, too: like Men in Black without the jokes. […] Side by side, these two plots all but defy you to care about what is happening: one character has no idea what she’s doing or why, while the other refuses to say. […] The sense that our heroes and villain could will almost anything to happen brings on an unfortunate shrivelling of emotional stakes. [¶] With its ruminations on everything from responsible government to humanity’s innate religious drive, Disclosure Day is unquestionably a big swing. But with Spielberg, big swings should be a given, and this one only glancingly connects.” Maybe the pond this film implies is just too deep for Spielberg’s intent to cross it properly, but me and Mr. Collin couldn’t be farther apart in our responses. So, your choice if you want to see what Spielberg does with aliens this time, with the acknowledgement you just have to be patient as the plot unfolds (just like when you wait through the ads/previews at official start time). I’ll leave you with my usual Musical Metaphor, again keeping connection with the U.K. in offering John Lennon’s "Gimme Some Truth" (1971 Imagine album) which fits the message of this film nicely: I’m sick and tired of hearing things / From uptight, short-sighted, narrow-minded hypocrites / All I want is the truth / Just give me some truth.” Well said, John.
SHORT TAKES
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