Spielberg's Close Encounters and Disclosure Day Aren't the Same Genre

Steven Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Disclosure Day occupy different territories, even as both put the director's fascination with alien life into a more timely story. Disclosure Day was not an official sequel to Close Encounters, but it is a spiritual sequel in every sense of the word, except perhaps in terms of genre.

Close Encounters follows Roy Neary's encounter with an alien ship and served as Spielberg's avatar on the hunt for answers. "I used to say to myself, 'Wouldn't it be wonderful if all of this turned out to be true?'" Spielberg said, and the film searches outward into the universe with skepticism built into a hopeful narrative.

steven spielberg, close encounters, disclosure day, alien life, roy neary, alien ship, spiritual sequel, genre, skepticism, hopeful narrative