Popcorn Perspectives with Danny Minton
Week of June 8, 2026
Disclosure Day
Rated PG-13 for some bloody images, action/violence and strong language
Rotten Tomatoes Score: 85%
In Theaters
If there was a poster child for movies about aliens from outer space, it would be director Steven Spielberg. It’s hard to imagine a conversation about the genre without mentioning movies like E.T., Close Encounters, War of the Worlds, and A.I. Artificial Intelligence (we try to forget about Kingdom of the Crystal Skull). And now there is Disclosure Day. The movie feels like Spielberg from the very beginning. With a script from David Koepp (Jurassic Park, War of the Worlds), a score by John Williams and cinematography by long-time collaborator Janusz Kaminski, there is no doubt who made the film from its opening moments to its closing credits. The story starts off like a mystery that the audience must be patient to unravel. A young man (Josh O’Connor) is running from an unknown branch of the government with some kind of secret technology in his possession. We are unaware of what this tech does, but we do know it is dangerous and weird things happen around it. We also know that a young weather girl from a Kansas City television station (Emily Blunt) suddenly has a gift to read minds and then understand and speak in all sorts of languages. When she goes on the air, she utters what sounds like a form of communication, but no one knows what it is. The two must somehow find each other and figure out how to use their abilities to change the world. I’ll let you unravel the story from here, as I think knowing too much can greatly hurt your enjoyment of the film. Personally, I wish I hadn’t seen a trailer and had gone in completely cold. What’s important here is the theme of the movie. It’s almost like Spielberg is preparing us for something. With his previous films, he made us either fall in love with or fear aliens. But it was always with a fantasy narrative. Here, it seems he is trying to tell us that information is about to hit, and you need to be ready for it. The world needs to be ready for it. It’s a move to have us at least somewhat mentally prepared for the inevitable disclosure that might be just around the corner, if you believe in that sort of thing. It won’t be just a small release of videos meant to distract from the Epstein Files, but full evidence of alien life on Earth. He asks big questions, like how religion will come into play. What effect will it have on the planet. Will it cause chaos? Will it simply change our worlds’ focus? It’s an adult alien film, and I do have a little concern that it won’t perform well at the box office, but it’s still worth watching, and might give us a lot to chew on as we begin to process its themes and its overarching questions. A-