AG Monday
Time for a close encounter. Can you guess what kind?
In 1977, the other big science fiction film release, aside from Star Wars, was Close Encounters Of The Third Kind. Riding the wave of success from Jaws, Steven Spielberg wrote and directed the iconic UFO movie that was also a blockbuster success. From the special effects to the soundtrack, from memorable scenes to top-notch filmmaking, Close Encounters was a smash success, both commercially and artistically.
While Jaws had been a blockbuster movie, Steven Spielberg wasn’t yet Steven Spielberg (spoken in hushed, reverential tones). Close Encounters made us stand up and take notice of him. It was a showcase for his directorial style that we’ve seen in decades of movies, and part of one of the most amazing runs of films from a young director (Jaws, Raiders Of The Lost Ark, E.T., The Color Purple, etc.).
Come with us back in time, back to the metroplex, to see, through our eyes, Close Encounters for the first time, and the reasons why we enjoyed it.
Messages from space! Benevolent conspiracies! Mashed potatoes! Living room art projects! Amazing cinematography! Criticisms of the parenting skills of fictional characters! It’s all here.
Ancient Geeks is a podcast about two geeks of a certain age re-visiting their youth. We were there when things like science fiction, fantasy, Tolkien, Star Trek, Star Wars, D&D, Marvel and DC comics, Doctor Who, and many, many other threads of modern geek culture were still on the fringes of popular culture. We were geeks before it was chic!
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Pre-listen comment. My snarky one line review of Close Encounters:
PHENOMENAL COSMIC BUILD-UP, itty-bitty payoff.
I’m willing to go along with Steven’s observation that the aliens’ motivations and actions may not be readily understood by humans*. But I’ll cite Kathy’s First Law on Alien Motivations and Actions: Whether or not these make sense to humans and/r cannot be readily understood, they have to make sense to the aliens; and furthermore, the author should both know and understand what these are.
When you break Kathy’s First Law, you don’t show or explain what the aliens did and why, because you don’t know.
You may safely assume I never liked this movie.
*I won’t claim to understand dogs all the time. For instance, Emm was always very excited to come upstairs to my room. She’d wag her tail, scratch at the door rather frantically, and run upstairs at all deliberate speed.
Why? One would assume because it meant play time. We’d do some keep-away with the stuffed animals, then she’d be able to catch one and chew on it.
Ok. but some times she’d just jump on the bed, find a comfortable spot, and just lay down there. I’d offer her a toy, but she’d just sniff it, sometimes also lick it, and go back to the urgent and exciting business on lying down on the bed.