Disclosure Day

It brings me no pleasure to say Disclosure Day wasn’t all that good… Because it wasn’t.  

That the great Steven Spielberg somehow missed his mark on this original Sci-fi piece… but he did. 

And unfortunately the same magic that set him apart for the past four decades didn’t translate into this stale, boring and predictable thriller.

The audience is thrust into the story immediately as Daniel (Josh O’Connor), has a secretive exchange with the Wardex organization during a wrestling event.  Basically, the objects that he stole from his Wardex national intelligence position, including alien technology, in exchange for his girlfriend Eve (Jane Blankenship).  The exchange goes awry and somehow Daniel ends up escaping with both the alien artifact and his girlfriend with the intention of disclosing to the world that alien’s exist.

And while that’s going on a meteorologist in Kansas City, Margaret Fairchild (Emily Blunt) has just been activated in some way, speaking foreign languages including an alien dialect live on TV. 

Somehow these two individuals, Margaret and Daniel, are destined to connect and show the world proof of an existence of an alien life form on earth. The only problem is that the Wardex doesn’t want that.  Led by Noah Scanlon (Colin Firth), who also has one of the three alien-rock artifacts that allows him to jump into other people’s bodies, controlling them like puppets. 

All of this occurring with a possible WW3 hovering in the background. I assume this is important, as a rational for the world to come together around this new information, however little attention is paid to this outside of the finale.

There are glimpses of the Spielberg touch, with some of the action sequences, look and lighting but it doesn’t hit that emotional connection with the characters and audiences that he’s perfected in years past.  

Emily Blunt was great in her role as Fairchild, but I have to say both Firth as the villain and O’Connor as the male lead were both miscast, with Firth failing to evoke much fear and O’Connor, the ability to get the audience to care about him or his goal.

In all honestly the script was very tame in the twists and turns and would have been better served if the two hero’s were younger, adolescents because in all honestly it felt like I was watching a movie of the week for two hours with a payoff at the end you see coming a mile away. 

It’s nice to see Spielberg back in the director chair, and I’m sure the receipts will be big in it’s initial weekend but Disclosure Day was a miss on his part and better left to see once it’s on streaming… if… you’re a fan of movie of the week sci-fi thrillers.  5 out of 10.