That feels as true as ever in “Disclosure Day.” Its two protagonists, a TV weathergirl (Emily Blunt) and a cybersecurity expert who works for a government subcontractor (Josh O’Connor), strangers to each other, experienced something profound as children that neither wants to face. Whatever it was that happened has put them on the same path, barreling toward the event of the movie’s title. Blunt discovers, suddenly, that she can quite literally speak other people’s languages — Chinese, Russian — and experience what they’re feeling, like, what’s in their hearts. He, meanwhile, has his own special power, an uncanny knack for numbers.
The two strangers might be Leah and Arnold Spielberg, the artistic feeler and the digital pioneer. But they’re also two parts of their son, the empathizer and the gadget nut. They’re both running from a Defense Department outfit called Wardex and toward a mysterious figure named Hugo (Colman Domingo). Hugo knows about their childhoods, their gifts, and that they’re destined to play a major role in the fate of the universe. We see him call the shots from a kind of soundstage where a crew is, mysteriously, constructing some kind of elaborate set, where all will be revealed. He’s the visionary, the director.
Hugo’s vision entails the planet coming to a halt for the movie’s climax, an event that blows coverage of an impending nuclear war off the nation’s screens to show us heartbreaking footage of the aliens — essentially, a Spielberg movie. The whole world watches it at the same time. The film is a cry for a monoculture that’s pure Spielberg.
We still have reasons to look up in Hollywood. For more than a year, studios have been serving us original movies that we’ve turned into hits. As I write this, a handful of the top 10 movies at the box office are based on original screenplays — “Obsession,” “Passenger,” “I Love Boosters.” Throw in a pop biography like “Michael” and a purposeful sequel like “The Devil Wears Prada 2,” and it all feels like a healthy complement to the umpteenth “Star Wars” product squatting at No. 1. The moment seems ripe for Spielberg to entreat us to show up for “Disclosure Day” and lead us back to ourselves.
For most of the film, Blunt’s character has no idea why or how she can reach into people and so profoundly relate to them. She’s a regular person but itinerant, avoidant. Now she has been called by a power she doesn’t even want to understand, a power to communicate with strangers to manipulate them for goodness’ sake, because they need to hear her short-order therapy. This gift is beyond her control, and she accepts this, that she’s an instrument for a higher purpose, to bring us together with a message of hope. She has a job to do. And despite the repressive forces trying to stop her, she does it.
Paolo Pellegrin is an award-winning Magnum photographer. He has documented a wide array of subjects, including war, the effects of climate change and the lives of cultural figures.
