As long as humans have looked up at the stars, we have contemplated our place in the universe. Throughout his filmography, Steven Spielberg has returned to the perennial question: Are we alone? In a 2026 interview with CBS, the director recalled watching the Perseids meteor shower as a child, which sparked a fascination with outer space that would eventually lead to his most recent film, Disclosure Day.
Spielberg’s 1982 film E.T. the Extraterrestrial tells the story of a benevolent alien who aids a child’s coming-of-age, and 1977’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind portrays a government cover-up of alien life, inspired by Watergate-era anxieties. Spielberg’s 2026 film Disclosure Day splits the difference between these premises, combining action sequences with humanistic revelations about the implications of extraterrestrial life.
Disclosure Day focuses on two protagonists: first, cybersecurity expert Daniel Killner (Josh O’Connor), who defects from a job at a company called Wardex after discovering that, on behalf of the government, the company had covered up extraterrestrial life, including the abuse of live specimens.
Through this plotline, Disclosure Day alludes to both new and old societal anxieties. By making a private company the antagonist, the film subverts the fear that government oppression is the biggest threat to individual freedom, a potent anxiety since the publication of George Orwell’s 1984. However, in the vein of Dave Egger’s 2011 novel The Circle, Spielberg updates Orwell’s dystopian worries with the idea that a corporation might be a bigger totalitarian threat.
The film’s second protagonist, news anchor Margaret Fairchild (Emily Blunt), unknowingly plays a role in the titular mission: disclosing evidence of extraterrestrials’ existence to the public. During a morning broadcast, Fairchild, in a trance, begins speaking in an alien language. Throughout the rest of the film, she embarks on a journey to unearth the childhood trauma that planted the ability to speak an alien language in her mind.
[Spoilers ahead.] When Kilner and Fairchild join forces, the resulting plot twists bear thematic weight. By confronting repressed memories, they discover the aliens chose them to facilitate the “disclosure”. This revelation occurs in a reconstruction of Fairchild’s childhood home, built by Hugo (Coleman Domingo), the leader of the resistance against Wardex.
Inside the replica of her childhood home, Fairchild confronts the memory of the day she was abducted by the extraterrestrial visitors, which allows her to master the powers these beings bestowed upon her. Meanwhile, the recreation of a familiar setting epitomizes a Spielbergian trope: suburban romanticism.
While this motif often lends itself to schmaltz, Spielberg’s nostalgia remains meaningful here. The peaceful setting lets the characters reflect on their pasts without stalling the plot. Inside the home, an origami cardinal mobile hangs above a crib, representing the extraterrestrials’ benevolence. (A cardinal is one of the apparitional forms the otherworldly visitors may take on.)
Indeed, when the aliens appeared to Fairchild in her youth, they disguised themselves as a fox, an elk, and a cardinal. When shown as their true selves, the aliens resemble “little green men”, but, by giving that depiction scant screen time, Spielberg reminds viewers that Disclosure Day is about humanity discovering its own place in the universe, regardless of what a higher being might dictate.
In a review of Disclosure Day for the New Yorker, Richard Brody writes that the film’s ending – where Earth’s population, at a standstill, watches proof of alien life broadcast to their smartphones – mirrors Spielberg’s ethos as a filmmaker: that “everyone should watch the same thing at the same time.” Indeed, Spielberg invented the summer blockbuster, a phenomenon that experienced a post-pandemic resurgence with “Barben-heimer“.
So the question remains: does Disclosure Day measure up to Spielberg’s earlier releases? Throughout the film, characters use specific terminology to refer to alien technology, and this specificity implies viewers should remember these terms. However, in the second half, they never mention them again. Spielberg eschews world-building for character development, leaving an ending where both aspects of the story feel unresolved.
That said, Disclosure Day resolves its thematic throughline when Fairchild, looking into a broadcast camera, tells the public to “Listen.” This moment of clarity contrasts with her earlier on-camera mishap, conveying the film’s message that people who attempt to understand each other can change the world.
In a 2026 interview with the New York Times, Spielberg said Disclosure Day is based on eyewitness accounts of people who claim to have encountered extraterrestrials. Although the director has had no such experience himself, he said that he now “believes the believers”. While this secondary faith is not far from corroboration, Spielberg does not require audiences to share it. Instead, his dependable protagonists inspire faith in humanity that most viewers, when they leave the cinema, may be reluctant to disclose.