I think how much you’ll like “Disclosure Day,” the newest film from Steven Spielberg, depends a lot on what your favorite film of his is. From the raw, thrumming energy of “Jurassic Park,” “Jaws” and “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” to the throwback sentimentality of “E.T.” and “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” back around to the calculated emotional devastation of “Schindler’s List” and “Saving Private Ryan,” Spielberg has managed to craft more all-time classics than it seems possible for one man to execute in a lifetime.
I’ve spent my entire life chasing the feeling I got from watching “Jurassic Park” for the first time at 13-years-old. That sense of wonder, combined with that feeling of being transported out of my body and onto Isla Nublar while being chased by hungry, pissed-off dinosaurs, is probably the most direct connection I can make to why I have dedicated so much of my life to writing about movies.
To say that I was looking forward to “Disclosure Day” is a massive understatement. If I had my druthers, I would make New Spielberg Movie Day a national holiday for all who celebrate, and while I know he’s not the most high-brow or “elevated” filmmaker, outside of Scorsese, I’m not sure if there’s any filmmaker still working whom the art form of motion pictures owes a larger debt to.
Does “Disclosure Day” live up to that hype? Not really, but I do think it’s a film that will age beautifully when divorced from expectations. I went in only knowing that Josh O’Connor plays a whistle-blower with evidence of extra-terrestrials and Emily Blunt plays a reporter who makes contact with the aliens on live TV. Don’t find out any more than that. Letting the story unfold at its own pace is one of the joys of the film, even as David Koepp’s script makes some genuinely bizarre storytelling choices.
If you go into “Disclosure Day” looking for Spielberg’s return to pulse-pounding popcorn cinema along the lines of the desperate terror of “War of the Worlds” or the paranoid sweatiness of “Minority Report,” recalibrate those expectations, as his newest is much more of a wide-eyed, hopeful transmission to the cosmos like “Close Encounters” or “E.T.” This is Spielberg at his most “I want to believe,” and it’s lovely to see.
Thematically, “Disclosure Day” works beautifully as we have a wide swath of characters all desperate for understanding. Whether it’s a math genius hoping to decode the universe, an unsatisfied woman trying to figure out her place in the world, a government official haunted by the loss of his wife, or an ex-novitiate trying to reconcile her faith with her cynicism toward humanity, these characters all have deep inner lives worth building a film around.
The problem lies with Koepp’s script. It sidelines characters for large chunks of screen time, begins in medias res so we lack emotional stakes and context, takes trips down narrative dead ends and can’t seem to reconcile whether it wants to be a goofy, warm-hearted adventure along the lines of “E.T.” or a deeply earnest look up to the skies like “Close Encounters.” Koepp remains one of the most profoundly inconsistent screenwriters in history. He’s responsible for not only my beloved “Jurassic Park,” but also the hugely disappointing new one with Scarlett Johansson. I don’t know how the same person writes the deliciously twisty “Black Bag,” the classically constructed original Tobey Maguire “Spider-Man” and the abysmal “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.”
Because Spielberg is such a master of pacing and tone, the movie still has momentary triumphs over its flailing script. We’re left with one of Emily Blunt’s finest performances and a genuinely optimistic view of the universe that I think we really needed at this point in history. More than a soulless popcorn blockbuster, “Discovery Day” feels like a deeply personal attempt for Spielberg to reconcile his religious faith with his belief in other life, his ever-shifting feelings toward mankind and our universal right to truth. He isn’t just asking if we’re alone; he’s taking aim at the modern landscape of calculated misinformation, government cynicism and our collective starvation for transparency.
Yet, as the runtime clocks past the two-hour mark, a distinct friction begins to form between the film’s towering thematic ambitions and its mechanical plot execution. It exists as a film that is both too conceptually vast and narratively undercooked. Spielberg crafts a film that literally begs us to rediscover our empathy, but does so in service to a script that doesn’t quite understand what makes humanity worth saving in the first place.
Despite the narrative conveniences and the script’s structural faults, the director’s visual alchemy remains unmatched at times. Several moments of transportive beauty here hushed the theater and pulled us completely to the edge of our seats. It may not rank in the top tier of his legendary filmography a few decades from now, but a middling, deeply human Spielberg film is still more vital than what almost anyone else is producing today. It proves that even when the map is flawed, the man behind the camera hasn’t lost his true north.
“Disclosure Day”
Dir. Steven Spielberg
Grade: B-
Now Playing at Regal Old Mill, Sisters Movie House, Redmond Cinema, Madras Cinema 5
This article appears in the Source June 18, 2026.
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