Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)

[**** stars / *****] 

"He says the sun came out last night. 

He says it sang to him."

Would Steven Spielberg movies feel as awesome minus the John Williams score? 

The Close Encounters of the Third Kind introductory buildup scene is classic Williams, a pitch black screen lights up to suspenseful nervy music, revealing a present day Mexican desert. 

We see officials running excitedly in disbelief to discover World War II airplanes in pristine condition, since their mysterious disappearance 30 years ago at the Bermuda Triangle.     

More strange events occur over the following days. Two commercial planes brush past an unidentified flying object (UFO), even as air traffic control center personnel listen intently. 

Then somewhere in Indiana, USA, three-year-old Barry wakes up in his room to see his toys moving about in the middle of the night. When his mother Jillian chases a wonder-struck Barry down the road, an astonishing event unfolds, changing the world as we know it. 

Sci-fi cinema magic 
Richard Dreyfuss, François Truffaut (acclaimed French director in a rare English film role) and Melinda Dillon are among the ensemble cast who invest us in this mystical sci-fi drama like no other.  

Even the outdated special effects doesn't take the sheen away from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, that's the kind of encompassing effect it invokes.  

One of a kind
The best movies take you on a journey. As the story unfolded, was relentlessly fascinated by - what happens next? 

The audio-visual, despite the make-believe, transcended, became a part of me. 

There is yet an alien movie to match what Spielberg has achieved here, the eternal wonder, unexpected culminating calm of discovering we are not alone. 

Though Spielberg did follow it up with the bewitching E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982), Close Encounters of the Third Kind is an sci-fi alien drama like no other. 

Alluring, enigmatic, and strangely fulfilling.