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Close Encounters of the Family Kind

In “Close Encounters of the Family Kind,” Rick Rekedal explores Steven Spielberg’s masterpiece from a new perspective, through the eyes of Roy Neary’s (Richard Dreyfuss) young son, Brad (Shawn Bishop), watching his father’s mid-life crises derail the only family he’s ever known.

My wife hates the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind. To her it’s the story of Roy Neary (Richard Dreyfuss) an absent husband who allows his obsession with UFOs to lose his job, ignore his children, take his wife Ronnie (the stellar Teri Garr) for granted, and stand idly back when Ronnie has had enough and takes their children to her sister’s house. Turning his head toward his obsession, the rest of the movie glamorizes Roy’s pilgrimage to Devil’s Tower in Wyoming, linking with another woman, Jillian Guiler (Melinda Dillon), who seems to understand the pull of the alien obsession. We never see Ronnie or the children again. Instead, when Roy finally walks on to the alien ship to leave planet Earth, he says his goodbyes to Jillian, the new woman in his life, who watches Roy with unbridled admiration as she clutches her own little boy, just returned to her by the aliens. Her little boy is fatherless, just like Roy’s own son Brad. Both sons in this story have been abandoned by their dads.

I feel a little differently about this film than my wife Vicki. It’s young Brad that I think about the most when I watch this story, one of my all-time favorite movies and, in my view, Spielberg’s masterpiece.

The first hour of the film is a cacophony of information. Huge tribes around the world are obsessed with the same strange song. The great French filmmaker François Truffaut, Spielberg’s idol, plays Dr. Lacombe, the sensitive and smart UFO researcher who eventually puts the pieces together of what these aliens are doing and how the human race might connect with them. We watch Roy spiral between his family and his irresistible obsession. The clearest exchange we see between Roy and his son Brad are over an argument whether to see Pinocchio; a small marionette of Pinocchio can also be seen among Roy’s stuff, a glimpse into Roy’s sense that with everything he has, he’s still dissatisfied, not yet the real boy he once dreamed of becoming.

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This Little Guy

August 22, 2022

Winston came to us 16 years ago. He was just about two, a stray passed from family to family in the Girl Scout troop. Vicki brought him home “for the weekend” and by that Sunday I went to the pet store and had a name tag engraved with “Winston” - put it in an envelope and gave it to our girls to open. They screamed and he was ours. Audrey was 3. Now she’s 19. Every family photo worth remembering includes Winston. Camping trips, holidays, birthdays, family reunions. Winston hid in a duffel so we could sneak him into my grandfather’s rest home as a therapy pet. He’s driven thousands of miles with us across the U.S. Once his stomach was ripped open in a tussle with a possum in our back yard - he needed 30 stitches but came back strong. We have removed 13 possums from our back yard (using a humane live animal trap) since then. He endured countless little girl slumber parties and countless hours being groomed, brushed, held and hugged. During Covid, Audrey carried him in a sling in the high Sierras when we hiked the sequoias. He sleeps every night on the floor by my bedside. For the past 3 years he has gone blind, needing guidance on walks and help getting outside. Taking care of Winston has been a lesson in slowing down, seeing the world through his careful cautious pace. Sometimes lately he forgets he is not outside when he pees. He bumps into the wall like a pinball, dutifully trying again to maneuver the living room. He walks gingerly with stiffness and has had trouble keeping down food. I cannot imagine our home without him. Tonight - Saturday, Aug 20 - is his last night with us. I have never “put down” a pet before. Sounds terrible. But my close friend in the animal space said “you can help him transition to a place of peace.” So tomorrow at 11, a vet is coming to the house. Winston has no idea. Today I bathed him and added fresh salmon, his favorite, to his food. So that’s my report. I’d rather share it now, when he is still with us, than after he leaves us. Vicki, Audrey and I will be together with him tomorrow. Ps. 50 says “I know all the birds of the hills, and every beast of the field is mine.” He will transition, and we will miss him forever.