“Disclosure Day” key art.
Universal Pictures
Disclosure Day, a new extraterrestrial tale from Steven Spielberg starring Emily Blunt, Josh O’Connor, Colin Firth and Colman Domingo, is winning over Rotten Tomatoes critics in a big way.
Directed by Spielberg, Disclosure Day plays in preview screenings on Thursday before opening in theaters nationwide on Friday. Disclosure Day’s screenplay is written by David Koepp, which is based on an original story by Spielberg.
In Disclosure Day, O’Connor plays Daniel Kellner, a cybersecurity expert who is on the run from the covert non-government organization he used to work for with secrets about the proof of alien contact on Earth. Desperate to stop Daniel and his colleague, Hugo Wakefield (Domingo) from disclosing the information about alien life to the masses is their former boss, Noah Scanlon (Firth), who believes the earth-shattering revelation will plunge an already fragile world into chaos.
Complicating matters is Margaret Fairchild (Blunt), a TV meteorologist who exhibits strange behavior and an indiscernable dialect on the air. If she connects with Daniel, it will provide them the opportunity to prove all the government conspiracies about aliens are true, an event that will forever change the history — and future — of the world.
Rated PG-13, Disclosure Day also stars Eve Hewson, Wyatt Russell, Henry Lloyd-Hughes and Elizabeth Marvel.
The review embargo for Disclosure Day lifted at 12 p.m. ET/9 a.m. PT on Tuesday and in early posts on Rotten Tomatoes, Disclosure Day has earned a 90% “fresh” critics score based on 92 reviews.
The RT Critics Consensus, Audience Score and Popcornmeter score based on verified user ratings are still pending.
Note: This article will be updated with more reviews and an updated critics’ score as soon as the information becomes available.
What Are Individual Critics Saying About ‘Disclosure Day’?
Peter Bradshaw of the Guardian is among the top critics on RT who gives the film a “fresh” score, writing, “Disclosure Day is never anything other than entertaining and grade-A fun; rare enough in the movies or anywhere else, rocketing along with barnstorming set-pieces, exhilarating chases, funny lines and a career-topper of a performance from Blunt.
David Fear of Rolling Stone is also impressed with the film, writing in his “fresh” take on the review aggregation site, “That cinematic Spielberg DNA is in Disclosure Day, and while this genre exercise may not hit the nosebleed heights of his best 21st century offerings, there’s more than enough of his presence to warrant a ticket purchase.”
Owen Gleiberman of Variety also gives the film a “fresh” score, writing on RT, “Scene for scene, the movie is a vigorous and diverting ride. Yet coming after the mountains of real UAP footage we’ve seen, Disclosure Day never gives you the contact high of awe that Close Encounters did.”
Consequence’s Liz Shannon Miller also awards the film a “fresh” score on RT, writing, “Disclosure Day is both small and massive in scope, a tightness could feel claustrophobic, except it allows the film to explore huge themes about faith and aliens, and how the existence of one might affect the other. In between the car chases, that is.”
Emily Blunt and Josh O’Connor in “Disclosure Day.”
Universal Studios
David Rooney of The Hollywood Reporter is also high on Disclosure Day, writing in his “fresh” review summary on RT, “For anyone who has loved his movies, Disclosure Day will be an essential addition to Spielberg’s rich body of work.”
Brian Tallerico of RogerEbert.com lauds the breadth of Disclosure Day, writing in his “fresh” RT review summary, This is a movie that reminds viewers that blockbusters can be morally and thematically complex while they’re entertaining the hell out of you.
IndieWire’s David Ehrlich also praises the film with a “fresh” take on RT, writing, “While Spielberg has never lost his sense of fun, Disclosure Day is uniquely fortified by the sense that he’s still searching for new ways to enrapture a jaded audience with his spectacle.”
Eli Friedberg of Slant Magazine is among the top critics on RT who gives Disclosure Day a “rotten” score, writing, “Delivered from the heights of personal and professional validation, the great prophet of Hollywood’s sermonistic latest is akin to a detached, rambling, and academic exercise that treats cinema and humanity as a great and curious jigsaw puzzle.”
Nicholas Barber of the BBC isn’t a fan of Disclosure Day, either. Barber in his “rotten” RT review summary calls the film “a flimsy, outdated car-chase thriller with no ideas about aliens that we haven’t heard before.”
Kristen Lopez of The Film Maven also deems the film “rotten,” writing on RT, “Disclosure Day is less an introspective, contemplative story about alien life, but a propulsive race against time whose high stakes premise smothers everything, including any type of interest in its characters.”
Disclosure Day plays in Thursday previews before opening in theaters nationwide on Friday.