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Who decides the news and who gets to tell it? 

You will hear more about aliens and other classic Spielberg themes as the excitement for his latest feature, DISCLOSURE DAY, heats up. Yes, if you think of CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND, AI, ET, and other filmic explorations of Spielberg’s obsession with life outside our planet—or alien visitations to earth, –you will be in his familiar ball park with DISCLOSURE DAY. But Emily Blunt’s character, Margaret Fairchild is by profession a weather girl. As Bob Dylan so eloquently put it, “You don’t need a weather man to know which way the wind blows.”

In our time, the truth is an endangered species, with news organizations tasked with reporting it shut down, or like “60 Minutes” –disabled. The theme hidden within other larger, more scientific themes in DISCLOSURE DAY is the weight of telling the truth. Not ignoring it. Not redirecting it. Not gaslighting. Speaking truth to power.  As Fairchild and Josh O’Connor’s character, Daniel Kellner, face extreme danger in order to “disclose,” we have a need to know.

These characters have experienced something that challenged their innocence, another Spielberg theme. Youth is often at jeopardy. Their connection propels the action—scene to scene riveting in David Koepp’s action-packed script. Joined by Coleman Domingo and Colin Firth—the grownups in the room at opposite levels of morality– Blunt and O’Connor are the questing figures—seeking the truth, finding it, and burdened with the task of revealing it. Even when Emily Blunt babbles on in foreign languages, pay close attention to the weather girl.