REALLY FOUND MY FAITH WHEN I heard that the government was opposed to the film. If NASA took the time to write me a 20-page letter, then I knew there must be something happening,” director and self-proclaimed UFO fanatic Steven Spielberg once said, regarding the impetus for making his 1977 epic Close Encounters Of The Third Kind.
Originally envisaged as a low-budget sci-fi movie titled Watch The Skies that was inspired by his childhood memories of witnessing a spectacular meteor shower, Close Encounters ultimately took its philosophy and elongated title from the 1972 book The UFO Experience: A Scientific Inquiry.
Written by astronomer and former UFO skeptic turned advocate Dr J Allen Hynek, the book stated that a Close Encounter of the First Kind was a UFO sighting with no evidence; the Second Kind was where a UFO leaves physical evidence, and the Third was when actual contact was made. Appropriately, Spielberg hired Hynek as a scientific consultant to lend legitimacy to proceedings.
Drawing on elements of his 1964 UFO home movie Firelight, Spielberg wrote this very personal project himself. It focuses on frustrated father Roy Neary (Richard Dreyfuss), an electrical engineer whose confrontation with a UFO overturns his everyman existence. Suddenly, Roy’s inner child is unleashed as he becomes strangely obsessed with recreating the inexplicable vision of what turns out to be Devils Tower, a unique geological formation.
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Denne historien er fra February 2024-utgaven av SFX UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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True Detective - The Only Way Is Essex for Jessica Jones in Lisa Jewell's first Marvel Crime novel
Known for bestselling psychological thrillers such as Then She Was Gone and The Family Upstairs, Jewell says she initially overemphasised the Marvel Universe’s fantastical elements before realising that she should simply trust her natural instincts. “I went too far on many occasions and had to keep cutting stuff out because I’d end up with stuff like a huge underground lab full of mad scientists,” she laughs.
Future Shock - Futurama's David X Cohen talks about what's in store for the show's ninth season
Futurama's David X Cohen talks about what's in store for the show's ninth season
Who Says
The Thirteenth Doctor and Yaz return - we're all ears
Parallel Doomsday
Terminator Zero creator Mattson Tomlin explains where the anime series fits within canon
Growing Your Hare
Daniel Kokotajlo talks about his '70s-set folk horror film Starve Acre
STAR TREK: DISCOVERY
TRIPS INTO TREK HISTORY PROVIDE SOMETHING OLD AND SOMETHING NEW FOR STAR TREK: DISCOVERY COSTUME DESIGNER ANTHONY TRAN
DAY OF THE JACKAL
TALKING TIME, TECH AND MYSTERIES IN PART TWO OF OUR INTERVIEW WITH DOCTOR WHO SHOWRUNNER RUSSELL T DAVIES
THE DARK KNIGHT RISES IN VINTAGE STYLE IN BATMAN: CAPED CRUSADER
BATMAN IS NOT FRIENDLY,\" insists Bruce Timm. \"He has to be weird. It's not just enough for him to dress up like a weirdo - he has to be a weirdo.
KAOS THEORY
THE LIVES OF GODS AND MEN ARE ENTWINED IN KAOS MEET THE TEAM BEHIND NETFLIX'S EPIC DARK COMEDY
POWER UP
THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RINGS OF POWER SHOWRUNNERS JD PAYNE AND PATRICK MCKAY PROMISE PLENTY OF TOLKIEN TREATS IN SEASON TWO