Roy Neary, an Indiana electric lineman, finds his quiet and ordinary daily life turned upside down after a close encounter with a UFO, spurring him to an obsessed cross-country quest for answers as a momentous event approaches.
Two parallel stories are told. In the first, a group of research scientists from a variety of backgrounds are investigating the strange appearance of items in remote locations, primarily desert regions. In continuing their investigation, one of the lead scientists, a Frenchman named Claude Lacombe, incorporates the Kodály method of music education as a means of communication in their work. The response, in turn, at first baffles the researchers, until American cartographer David Laughlin deciphers the meaning of the response. In the second, electric company lineman and family man Roy Neary and single mother Jillian Guiler are among some individuals in Muncie, Indiana who experience some paranormal activity before some flashes of bright lights in the sky, which they believe to be a UFO. Roy becomes obsessed with what he saw, unlike some others, especially in some form of authority, who refuse to acknowledge their belief that it was a UFO in not wanting to appear crazy. That obsession both for Roy and Jillian is ratcheted up a notch when they begin to have a vision of a mound with vertical striations on its side as a key to what is going on. While the obsession negatively affects Roy's life as he knows it in its entirety, Jillian knows she has to find the answer as to its meaning, especially as it relates to her only child, three year old Barry Guiler, who may be more attuned to what is happening than the adult figures around him. These two stories have the potential to intersect if Roy and Jillian can discover where they've seen that mound before, and if they can overcome what they believe to be the lies perpetrated by those in authority in covering up what is going on.—Huggo
Tormented by strange, unexplained visions after what seemed like a close encounter of the first kind, Indiana family man Roy Neary struggles to understand. In the meantime, as the news of unprecedented phenomena and tangible UFO manifestations spread like wildfire, single mother Jillian Guiler's world turns upside down. Now, the U.S. government is trying to run the show, and French scientist Claude Lacombe hopes to communicate with the extraterrestrial visitors. But Roy must know. Is the image haunting his mind real? If we are not alone in the universe, what will it take to make first contact--a close encounter of the third kind?—Nick Riganas
Roy Neary sets out to investigate a power outage when his truck stalls and he is bathed in light from above. After this, strange visions and five musical notes keep running through his mind. Will he find the meaning of the visions, and who - or what - placed them in his mind?—Colin Tinto <[email protected]>
Planes reported missing in 1945 suddenly appear in the Mojave desert. A commercial flight is buzzed by a 'bright' object that the pilot 'wouldn't know how to describe'. Roy Neary, while working one night, has a Close Encounter... The US Government determine where the visitors plan to land and create an elaborate cover-up to keep people away. However, a group of people, including Neary, share a vision which draws them to the place and a meeting with new, and old, friends.—Mark Harding <[email protected]>
In the Sonoran Desert, French scientist Claude Lacombe (François Truffaut) (a French government scientist in charge of UFO-related activities in the United States) and his American interpreter, mapmaker David Laughlin (Bob Balaban), along with other government scientific researchers, discover Flight 19, a squadron of Grumman TBM Avengers that went missing more than 30 years earlier. The planes are intact and operational, but there is no sign of the pilots. An old man who witnessed the event claimed, "the sun came out at night, and sang to him." They also find a lost cargo ship in the Gobi Desert named SS Cotopaxi. At an air traffic control center in Indianapolis, a controller listens as two airline flights narrowly avoid a mid-air collision with an apparent unidentified flying object (UFO), which neither pilot chooses to report, even when invited to do so. In Muncie, Indiana, 3-year-old Barry Guiler (Cary Guffey) is awakened in the night when his toys start operating on their own. Fascinated, he gets out of bed and discovers something or someone (off-screen) in the kitchen. He runs outside, forcing his mother, Jillian (Melinda Dillon), to chase after him.
Investigating one of a series of large-scale power outages, Indiana electrical lineman Roy Neary (Richard Dreyfuss) experiences a close encounter with a UFO, when it flies over his truck and lightly burns the side of his face with its bright lights. The UFO, joining a group of three other UFOs, is pursued by Neary and three police cars, but the spacecraft fly off into the night sky. Roy becomes fascinated by UFOs, much to the dismay of his wife, Ronnie (Teri Garr). He also becomes increasingly obsessed with subliminal, mental images of a mountain-like shape and begins to make models of it. Jillian also becomes obsessed with sketching a unique-looking mountain. Soon after, she is terrorized in her home by a UFO which descends from the clouds. The presence of the UFO energy field makes every appliance in Jillian's house malfunction and Barry is abducted by unseen beings.
Lacombe and Laughlin-along with a group of United Nations experts-continue to investigate increasing UFO activity and strange, related occurrences. Witnesses in Dharamsala, India report that the UFOs make distinctive sounds: a five-tone musical phrase in a major scale. Scientists broadcast the phrase to outer space but are mystified by the response: a seemingly meaningless series of numbers (104 44 30 40 36 10) repeated over and over until Laughlin, with his background in cartography, recognizes it as a set of geographical coordinates, which point to Devils Tower near Moorcroft, Wyoming. Lacombe and the U.S. military converge on Wyoming. The United States Army evacuates the area, planting false reports in the media that a train wreck has spilled a toxic nerve gas, all the while preparing a secret landing zone for the UFOs and their occupants.
Meanwhile, Roy erratically began throwing plants, dirt and other garbage through the window into the kitchen, causing upset Ronnie to leave him, taking their three children with her. When a despairing Roy inadvertently sees a television news program about the train wreck near Devils Tower, he realizes the mental image of a mountain plaguing him is real. Jillian sees the same broadcast, and she and Roy, as well as others with similar visions and experiences, travel to the site in spite of the public warnings about nerve gas.
Most of the civilians who are drawn to the site are apprehended by the Army. All the civilians are interviewed by Lacombe and David. They conclude that it has to mean something that each one of the civilians had the same vision of Devil's tower and were compelled to be there even at the pain of death itself. They try to convince the army to pass them through, but the army refuses.
Roy and Jillian escape army custody and make it to the landing site just as dozens of UFOs appear in the night sky. The government specialists at the site begin to communicate with the UFOs by use of light and sound on a large electrical billboard. Following this, an enormous mother ship lands at the site, releasing animals and over a dozen long-missing adults and children, all from different past eras. Among these returned abductees include the missing pilots from Flight 19 and sailors from the Cotopaxi, all of whom have strangely not aged since their abductions. Barry is also returned and reunited with a relieved Jillian. The government officials decide to include Roy in a group of people whom they have selected to be potential visitors to the mothership, and hastily prepare him.
As the aliens finally emerge from the mothership, they select Roy to join them on their travels. As Roy enters the mothership, one of the aliens pauses for a few moments with the humans. Lacombe uses Curwen hand signs that correspond to the five-note alien tonal phrase. The alien replies with the same gestures, smiles, and returns to its ship, which ascends into space.
