Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)

REVIEW

!! SPOILER WARNING !!

After the runaway success of Jaws (1975), Steven Spielberg was virtually given carte blanch to do whatever he wanted. What he really wanted was to finally bring to the screen a project that had been brewing for some time - a science fiction movie that would eventually stand in stark contrast to the pantomime hysterics of George Lucas' Star Wars (1977). The result was Close Encounters of the Third Kind, an epic tale of Mankind's first contact with intelligent life from another world that has tended to be somewhat derided since the global success of the more darkly inclined The X-Files (1993 - 2002), which is shameful as Close Encounters (in any of its many incarnations) is one of the most lyrical and optimistic films of its kind. For its time, Close Encounters was unique, a film that followed the various attempts of a disparate group of characters, some military, some from the world of academia, but mostly just ordinary people, to decipher and understand the cryptic and often mystical events that eventually lead them all - via different routes, following different chains of arcane clues - to the momentous first contact at a peculiar mountain in Wyoming.

The first act is exemplary work; after the stunningly simple opening title sequence (minimal credits are exposed on a blank screen as John William's eerie music builds to a deafening crescendo before the screen erupts with light, signalling the dazzling light show that will eventually accompany the landing of the aliens in the climax. A series of vignettes introduces us to the key players and sketches in hazy details of a series of other-worldly contacts that seem, at first, utterly impenetrable; an international team of UFO chasing scientists, led by Frenchman Claude Lacombe (Francois Truffaut, acting for the only time in a film he didn't direct and making an excellent job of it) find a flight of World War 2 fighters stranded at a remote settlement in the desert, a flight that had vanished many years before; a pair of airliners over Indianapolis are buzzed by strange aircraft; a young boy, Barry Guiler wanders off into the night, chasing unseen friends who have gatecrashed his mum's kitchen, while his distraught mother Gillian gives chase; and the film's everyman focus, electrical repairman Roy Neary has a worryingly close encounter with a UFO and joins in a reckless chase through the suburbs in pursuit of a trio of glowing objects.

This apparently unconnected sequence of events economically sets the tone for what is to come. The aliens are painted in a vaguely sinister light (they certainly aren't averse to a little breaking and entering, vandalism, wanton displays of reckless behaviour and irresponsibly leading young children astray) yet remain somehow enigmatic, unfathomable and even playful. Dreyfuss and Dillon are superb, deftly sketching in the bare bones of their characters, ably supported by Teri Garr as Neary's increasingly frazzled wife Ronny. With commendable brevity, Spielberg cannily established a three way interaction between the inscrutable aliens, the academics who have devoted the better parts of their lives to contacting them and the disoriented, overawed civilians who just happen to have been in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Close Encounters does tend to suffer somewhat from this remarkable, almost textbook opening act as it gets bogged down in its middle section, tracing Neary's psychological collapse as he struggles to interpret the images of a distinctive, mountain like shape that has been haunting him since his initial encounter. While Dreyfuss undoubtedly gives a superb and often painful performance, he simply cannot compensate for the fact that the rest of the story is largely ignored during these moments - apart from the set piece abduction of Barry from his own home, the aliens figure hardly at all during the second act, and the scientists are reduced to merely popping by now and again to mouth off their indecipherable jargon and hint heavily that something impressive is on its way to meet us. Spielberg himself seemed fully aware of the second act's failings and, with the re-edited Special Edition, he saw fit to add an extra set piece with the scientists, the discovery of a beached ship in the Gobi desert that does nothing for the overall narrative bit which serves to remind us that Lacombe and his team are still with us. Sadly, he perhaps overdid the extra footage of Neary breaking down, but wisely cut back on his virtual demolition of his suburban home to build the scale model of the Devil's Tower mountain in Wyoming, an image implanted in his subconscious by the aliens in an effort to attract them to the landing zone.

The final third is where Spielberg pulls out all the stops and transforms a hitherto expertly made thriller into a dazzling, deeply emotional experience, the likes of which simply hadn't been seen in many a long year. Evading the military attempts to capture and detain them, Gillian and Roy arrive at the Devil's Tower in time to witness a stunning aerial ballet performed by the UFOs and the subsequent first contact, performed with a five note musical scale, between the scientists and the three UFOs that Neary initially encountered.

Then, in one of the most remarkable sequence that Spielberg has ever filmed, a deathly silence falls over the landing zone, broken only by the distant chatter of radio communication. Shocked radar operators stumble from their Portacabins and stare skywards - something huge is approaching the Tower. And sure enough the alien mothership has arrived, a glorious, city sized monstrosity that drifts serenely over the mountain, turns spectacularly on its head and settles on and dwarfs the base. Thinking about it ruins the illusion (how does the mothership manage to hide behind the mountain like that? And why does it need to flip on its head before landing?) but it's an amazing moment that manages to be awe-inspiring and terrifying all at the same time. The visual effects are still flawless and the spooky sight of the mothership emerging from behind the Devil's Tower, underscored only by a faint rumbling sound, remains one the key images in the genre.

Although the government agents are subsequently exposed as liars and conspirators, willing to gas civilians to keep them from the elaborate landing zone they've erected for the coming of the aliens, they are largely non-threatening, a far cry from the shadowy cabal that later stalked Mulder and Scully in The X-Files. The two audience identity figures, Gillian and Roy, manage to outwit them at every turn and in the end Lacombe is revealed as a benign figure willing to allow Neary the chance to make the ultimate journey and join the aliens on their return home. Explicit criticism of the government's actions are left to Chris Carter and co - here, the criticism is understated and implicit, but it's there nontheless, as one would expect from a film that was written during the Watergate era.

But politics weren't really on Spielberg's agenda. What he set out to do was provide an antidote to the alien invasion paranoia movies of the 50s, to offer an alternate view on what might happen should aliens turn up to say hello. He did it so well that no-one actually bothered to rip-off Close Encounters directly - following its massive success, there were many screen alien visitation but none of them were as optimistic as Spielberg's vision, preferring instead to get out the ray guns, anal probes and genetic experiments for a string of increasingly paranoid - and inferior - knock-offs.

The greatest testament to Spielberg's achievement is that Close Encounters remains a gripping and exciting film in an era when over-the-top action scenes and wall-to-wall CGI effects are the order of the day. His uncanny eye for the beguiling image and his perfect grasp of the dynamics of cinematic storytelling result in a film that is as engrossing now as it was when it was first released - it's a simple story, brilliantly told, pitting people just like us into a mystery that absorbs the audience every bit as much as it does the protagonists. It cemented Spielberg's reputation as a master film-maker and remains one the very best in his extraordinary body of work.
KEVIN LYONS

Last Updated: 15 October, 2008