Dec. 18, 2025
Today is Steven Spielberg’s birthday! That makes today the perfect time to talk about his new film Disclosure Day. It’s been so long since Spielberg gave us an otherworldly banger that sometimes it’s easy to forget that he’s one of the all-time giants of science fiction cinema. His last film in the genre, Ready Player One, was released seven years ago, an eternity in pop culture years. But for those with bad memories, let’s remember that he also directed the Tom Cruise version of War of the Worlds, Minority Report,Close Encounters of the Third Kind, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, the first two Jurassic Parkfilms, andA.I. Artificial Intelligence. He is an undisputed and historic master of science fiction.
Mystery Loves Company
So now that he’s dropped the trailer for his return to the genre with Disclosure Day, starring Emily Blunt (A Quiet Place, Edge of Tomorrow, Looper) and Colin Firth (1917, Kingsman: The Secret Service), expectations are very high. So what do we have here?
Well, if we’re using Hollywood studio comps shorthand, the mysterious trailer comes off as Arrival meets Close Encounters of the Third Kind, but framed by the social media era, a few crop circles, and a bit of religion tossed in. It’s a bit jumbled, but a trailer that’s not easy to figure out is actually fun in an age of predictable plotlines. Those familiar with M. Night Shyamalan and J.J. Abrams will immediately recognize the Spielberg style in the trailer and perhaps not realize that he is the one who influenced the aforementioned directors in terms of framing, pace, and cinematography. So if it looks like an M. Night trailer, you’re right, but Spielberg is the originator.
Uncanny Valleys
Now for the not-so-good. The CGI animals, which are prominent in the trailer, are just not convincing. A bird very deliberately flies into a home and faces off against a family. Another scene shows a herd of deer sauntering up to the windows of a home as if they’re trying to communicate with the people inside. None of these animals pass the uncanny valley test. They don’t look real. And then, near the end of the trailer, a young girl is shown walking with a group of forest animals toward a home. In this scene, not only do the animals look unreal, but even the human looks fabricated.
So one of three things seems to be happening here: 1. The studio incorrectly assumed the possibly unfinished VFX were good enough for a short trailer. 2. Spielberg, at 80 years old, has maybe lost a step and allowed the VFX team to deliver less than what we expect from his usual high VFX pedigree. 3. Spielberg is experimenting with generative AI, and we’re watching the rough stages of its initial use by a major director.
Since Spielberg is usually very tech-forward, that last AI possibility is tempting to believe, but it doesn’t align with his recent comments on AI.
Are We Cooked?
“I think the soul is unimaginable and ineffable. The soul cannot be created by any algorithm. It is something that exists in all of us,” said Spielberg during a 2023 interview with Stephen Colbert. “To lose that, because books and movies and music are being written by machines that we created and now we’re letting them run with [it]? That terrifies me… It’ll be The Twilight Zone episode ‘To Serve Man,’ it’ll turn out to be a cookbook, and we’re on the menu.”
For those unfamiliar with that famous episode from 1962, it depicts a seemingly friendly alien race who arrives on Earth with a manual whose title is written in alien script. The humans eventually decipher the title of the book and translate it as “To Serve Man.” Since the aliens have been friendly up until then, the humans assume the title indicates a desire to help mankind. Nerves are calmed and the humans begin working freely with the aliens.
Then, a large number of humans board an alien ship to be taken to the alien homeworld for a “friendly” visit. But at the last minute, before one human passenger takes off, a human translator who isn’t on the alien ship reveals that the book is, in fact, a cookbook. The tale is a parable about our arrogance and naivete as a species in the face of the unknown, and what trouble it could lead to.
It’s a rather dark take on AI from Spielberg, but not without merit. It’s true, we don’t know where this AI story is going. And even AI experts are divided as to whether AI will eventually pose an “alien-like” threat to humanity. But the fact that Spielberg is still thinking with such a science fiction nerd’s brain tells us that, rough trailer VFX aside, Disclosure Day will definitely be interesting, and that he probably won’t be joining James Cameron as one of the pioneers of AI video in Hollywood.
Universal Pictures’ Disclosure Day will hit theaters on June 12, 2026.
Cover via YouTube/Universal Pictures
