Director: Steven Spielberg
Cast: Emily Blunt, Josh O’Connor, Colin Firth, Colman Domingo
Have I Seen It Before: By the end of opening weekend, I ended up seeing it twice.
Did I Like It: Well, I’ve found the film that every year seems to need lately. We’ve all got to take some position on this thing now, and it wouldn’t be the worst idea if we come up with our stances on the people who have a different stance.
If you completely dismiss the film, I find myself automatically distrusting you. We can have a discussion about where it might rank in the Spielberg pantheon, I may even have a qualm or two about the final act (more on that later). That’s all fine. When you watch it, it might not hit you in the way you had absolutely hoped. Judging a movie by your mood that day feels like it shouldn’t be the way to more incisive criticism, but it’s also hard to shake it off completely.
But if the think piece you’ve been cooking up for your own blog has a title anywhere alogn the lines of “Here’s Why You’re Right If You Hated Disclosure Day” then quite frankly, you are dis-invited from my birthday party this year. Just cancel, already.
Spielberg. Aliens. John Williams score. Not all of that’s going to happen a whole lot more times, lest I remind you. What’s more, the plot has something profound to say about what it means to be human in the 2020s. Cynicism is everywhere. We should listen. It also has some of the better car chases I’ve seen in a good long while, and Emily Blunt is giving one of the best performances of the year. You can have faith in Spielberg’s, and if something doesn’t quite work for you… I dunno. Go see it again?
That faith in the master’s skills might not extend to his philosophy. While I’m on board with the need for a little less guile in the world, the reality of this story ending with every one on the planet believing what they’re seeing doesn’t ring as true as living through the last decade of human history would seem to indicate.
But then that might be the point. When we were young, we had the fantasy of having an extra-terrrestrial best friend. Now, we are all much older, and we have to yearn for a world that might listen.