The French director François Truffaut once said that “when a film achieves a certain success, it becomes a sociological event.” Such was the case with Steven Spielberg's “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” a movie in which Truffaut himself appeared as a scientist exploring the possibility of extraterrestrial life, and which was initially greeted with something like religious awe.
“Close Encounters” will mark its 40th anniversary with appropriate fanfare. In addition to a presentation at the Venice Film Festival on Thursday, the movie, newly remastered and digitally restored, opens on Friday for a special weeklong run in theaters across the country.
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