"We are not alone!" screamed the ads when Close Encounters of the Third Kind was first released to theaters in 1977. After about 95 minutes of ponderous suburban angst, the viewer indeed discovered they had a friend or two in the skies.
I was just a stupid kid when I first saw Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and I really didn't have the slightest clue what in the hell was going on. But oh how I loved the finale, a special effects-choked extravaganza which became one of the most famous scenes in cinema history. The seemingly endless buildup had some kind of payoff, and director Steven Spielberg's career was set for life (well, he did follow this film with the 1941 disaster). Close Encounters gets stronger with each viewing, though Spielberg has famously tinkered multiple times with the product.
I've seen the Special Edition, where we actually go inside the spacecraft; I've seen the Collector's Edition where we no longer go inside the spacecraft but the story has been re-edited; I've seen the Making of documentary where we discover the deadlines Spielberg was forced to work under and the different ideas for the spaceships and aliens. It's all a part of the myth of Close Encounters.
The spring of 1978 for me was the season of Star Wars and Close Encounters. It was my first year of junior high school. My friends and I would still ride bikes through the neighborhood. Our parents would drop us off at the cramped mall theaters. The great ongoing debate was whether Star Wars or Close Encounters was the better film. Many said "Star Wars." But for me, the most awestruck revelation in film history was Close Encounters.
I still love Spielberg's epic UFO creation and watched it again just the other night. It's a sort of quasi-religious experience for a kid raised on War of the Worlds and Invaders From Mars. In Close Encounters, the aliens were friendly and most shocking of all - we were nice to them! This had not been done before as the alien standard was usually a growling James Arness dressed as a murderous carrot. With Close Encounters, Cold War paranoia was rinsed away.
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Article comments
1 - Aaron, Duke De Mondo
Chris, brilliant article concerning one of my fave spielberg flicks (although one i haven't saw as often as i would like).
you're spot on with the whole "sense of wonder" carry-on's. It's kind of a cliche now, but there is an honest to god sense of childlike awe at work in that film. It manages to make the viewer as amazed as the characters.
Also, despite the benevolent nature of the ET types, it's an incredibly scary flick. Really eerie, and although M Night Shyamalan gets a lot of flack, i think his Signs came pretty close to recreating that sense of fear of the unknown.
Great work, and glad to see you made the taxi driver link. I too often felt this film owed as much to Schraders original screenplay as anything else. The torture going on in the male lead is just too close to what ol' travis was going through, albeit with more aliens.
Thanks, man.
2 - Chris Kent
Thank you El Senor Duke for your comments.
This flick is a childhood favorite of mine and pulled it off the old shelf the other night and watched it for the first time in several years. Don't know if I would call this one of my top-10 films, but something about this flick reminds me of my own childhood/early teen years growing up......
Some people love Star Wars, others Snow White or Bambi and still others Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and Willy Wonka.
For me, it's some weird hybrid of Conquest of the Planet of the Apes and Close Encounters of the Third Kind.......;)
3 - Chris Kent
A note on M Night Shyamalan....I've knocked this guy in the past, but I really do love The Sixth Sense. Signs, oddly enough, I liked much, much better upon second viewing. I had certain expectations going in to that film and they were not met. However, it is a fine, suspenseful flick and Mel Gibson is just terrific. The tone of the film is far more ominous than Close Encounters, and once an alien makes an appearance, the film falls a few notches.
M Night Shyamalan did the same thing Spielberg did in Close Encounters by not entirely giving us a clear look at the alien, but the technique was too obvious in Signs and it did not work.
That being said, I am looking forward to his film The Village, though once again I have certain expectations going in.....