I tried really hard to like Steven Spielberg’s Disclosure Day, but Steven Spielberg doesn’t make it easy. A confused and somewhat tedious sci-fi thriller that was presumably more profound in the mind of the storied filmmaker than what we experience on screen, Spielberg’s latest isn’t without its entertainment value but lacks the magic you’d expect.
And spends two and a half hours searching for it.
Disclosure Day is about a dude (Josh O’Connor) who has stolen a collection of highly confidential documents from a government-backed organization with intent to release to the world their secret: that aliens undeniably exist. He’s hunted by the company’s leader (Colin Firth) and is joined by a TV weather woman (Emily Blunt) who for some reason has started speaking alien.
Disclosure Day is equally intriguing and mystifying. Spielberg, working from a screenplay by David Koepp, delivers several effective moments, but the sum is most definitely less than its parts. We’re dropped right into the action, but everything is only half-developed, characters captivating yet confusing, plot points exciting yet half-assed.
Even worse, the movie lacks the awe-inspiring machinations you expect from a Steven Spielberg one, especially a sci-fi thriller such as this with so much potential.
While there are moments where Spielberg’s talents shine through, Disclosure Day is oddly flat. The bursts of action never amount to much, the characters become increasingly tedious, and the grating pacing in the film’s midsection reveals the devastating truth: this movie just isn’t very good.
There are elements I liked. O’Connor is good, for a while, until he is sidelined in the third act. His girlfriend Jane (Eve Hewson) is arguably the film’s most fascinating character, but Spielberg ultimately does nothing with her. And the climax finally captures a bit of that Spielberg magic even if, as my girlfriend pointed out, would probably play out in a much more cynical way in real life.
But Disclosure Day is more a jumble of weird ideas strung together into a story that, in hindsight, isn’t nearly as compelling as its early moments would suggest. It doesn’t help that Colin Firth isn’t a very convincing villain, and Spielberg refuses to let him sharpen his teeth. The big character reveal for Blunt and O’Connor’s characters doesn’t land the way Spielberg intended. Further, there’s one sequence during this reveal that feels like it’s ripped from a cheesy Disney cartoon, thanks to poorly animated CGI animals (suggestion: if your movie requires CGI animals, don’t do it!).
Disclosure Day maintains a moderate level of entertainment value through much of its runtime, but it’s the kind of movie you keep watching hoping it’ll get better–and then it never does. I really wanted to like this one, and for a while I convinced myself I was, but in hindsight that was me just giving Spielberg the benefit of the doubt. This time around, he doesn’t deserve it.
Review by Erik Samdahl. Erik is a marketing and technology executive by day, avid movie lover by night. He is a member of the Seattle Film Critics Society.