Disclosure Day - It's Them Aliens Again

It's Steven Spielberg. Very rarely does he miss.

Disclosure Day is all about the truth and what it means to be human. A secret military group, the Wardex Corporation, is the keeper of all the information on alien life , and maybe they use any technology they come across and reverse engineer for their own personal gain. Until one day, people within in that group decide it's been long enough and that people deserve to know.

The movie starts off with a big action sequence. Daniel Kellner, Josh O'Connor, is facing off a small army to get his girlfriend back and this guy is no John Wick sadly, but he is the man that not only stole all the secrets; he stole a small case of weapons and the CEO of Wardex wants them all back...at any cost.

We next meet Kansas City meteorologist Margaret Fairchild, played by Emily Blunt, is preparing for the day when a cardinal flies into the kitchen. Her boyfriend, Jackson is charmed by it while she's drawn to it. As the bird flies away, she begins speaking a foreign language as if she's speaking English. This is just the beginning of her very weird day.

Side note/tagent here...I work for a TV station. Even though its not a large market as Kansas City is, most tend to work the same way. A meteorologist cannot and will not show up JUST before their hit time. Ever. This isn't something you just show up and do. You come in, pour over the weather data, build your graphics for your show. You CANNOT just pop in and get makeup put on you 30 seconds before you're to go live on air. Also, helps to have a degree in meteorology. Wanting to be a reporter, you don't tend to go that route to fill a hole in your resume until you get called up to the big leagues.

This is why I hate the tropes of movies and TV were any person can show up for an interview for a "weather person" and get the job without actually knowing anything about how the weather works. The job isn't just showing up and telling the people it's going to rain and what the temperatures might be. It's a lot of hard work and analyzing weather patterns, wind and temperature fluctuations and how they'll effect the environment around them.

It's a hard job. A science based job and there's a reason many are trusted to deliver you the weather. We have a reporter that's an emergency fill-in and she does well enough to deliver a good weathercast. She just can't go as in-depth as the morning, weekend, and evening chief can discussing why the weather is doing what its doing.

So when you see this in sitcoms/movies/dramas, put on the suspenders of disbelief, because it doesn't often happen like you see depicted here. The anchors that were delivering info on a potential WWIII situation didn't help. While what they were discussing was serious, they came across bland. They were stiff and monotoned. No inflection as they talked. Reporters and anchors tend to not do that either.

That was the biggest gripe I had of the movie. That and the local news aspect in front of the camera. The behind the scenes stuff at the end, that was fairly accurate.

A large portion of the first half seemed to be paced really slow. Daniel and Jane on the run from the agency group, Margaret with Jackson trying to get to them; though, Jackson was more adamant about trying to get Margaret to the hospital because he thought she wasn't well. Each scene felt long, but they were important and needed.

Daniel and Jane had things they had to learn about each other (disclosing information you might want to say) about her past and what Daniel REALLY did for a living. He shows her what's on the drives he stole, showing her why he's doing what he's doing and why the world needs to know.

Margaret makes her way to Daniel, using some new powers of just knowing information about people around her.

The second half when they finally team up and race back to Kansas City to reveal the truth to people, that's when they kick it into high gear. The action sequences are intense and you're on the edge of your seat as they try to find a way to escape the corporation's grasp.

When Disclosure Day truly begins, its...a lot. It feels very true to the situation and as they show the videos they obtained of alien life, aliens being tortured and examined. You feel the weight of it as it goes national and a NYC anchor is trying to find the words to describe what she's seeing and in many ways feeling. She can barely form words.

The images you see mostly speak for themselves and you have to wonder what it would be like if this kind of evidence was brought forth to our world. Actual proof that alien life is out there and it's been covered up from the beginning.

Since I was a kid, I've always believed in the possibility of the impossible. I loved watching shows about aliens and ghosts on TLC and History channel...you know, when they actually gave a damn about teaching people before it became a cesspool of reality tv under the guise of education. I would love to meet an alien, so long as their friendly and not in the 'abduct me and experiment on me' types. I'd want to talk to them if they could communicate to me and ask questions about the universe.

Because it's a huge, infinite universe out there. Untold planets and stars and galaxies. Who's to say life didn't find a way to live and thrive out there. Evolving in its own set of circumstances in a billion different ways. It's hard to know how large the whole of existence is and just think we're all that there is. There has to be more. There should be more. I like to think there is more.

That's the point of this movie. It makes you truly think how big this universe is and our place in it. It's a thrill ride to get to the station and when it takes time for quiet moments and during the reveal, you feel it. You feel all of it.

That's what Spielberg does better than most when crafting a story. His direction and the faith he puts in his actors, it feels real and authentic to the world he's creating. You root for the heroes and want to see the villains get their comeuppance.

This is a movie everyone should see once. I'd lean towards seeing in theaters to see the scope of it on the big screen, but given the economy these days, you can wait for streaming if you'd like, but it wouldn't feel as big as it's supposed to be.

4/5...TV news stuff loses it a point.