‘The Phenomenon’ takes grounded approach to UFOs with testimonies from government officials
Marc Barasch knows that, while many people are open to the idea of life on other planets, there’s still a lot of doubt around extraterrestrials, unidentified flying objects and the like.
“It sounds like the stuff of science fiction,” says Barasch, 71, of Berkeley, Calif. “It’s easy for all of us, myself included to say, ‘Well, it’s a maybe.’ ”
But the new documentary “The Phenomenon,” which Barasch wrote, aims to move the discussion of alien life onto more solid ground.
The movie, which was produced by 1091 Pictures and is available for digital download, contains testimony from astronauts, UFO investigators and also government officials, including former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Intelligence Christopher Mellon and former Senator Harry Reid.
The film, directed by James Fox, comes on the heels of the Pentagon’s announcement of the establishment of an Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force, which is charged with studying any aerial phenomena that could pose a threat to U.S. security.
In “The Phenomenon,” multiple sources state that UFOs have been under investigation by the military since the 1940s. The movie aims to be a serious examination of UFOs and UFO sightings, says Barasch, the son of the late Norman Barasch, a playwright, comedy writer and longtime Greenwich resident.
Indeed, “The Phenomenon” seems more of a journalistic documentary than a disposable “conspiracy theory” film, right down to the use of actor Peter Coyote — a mainstay of Ken Burns’s longform documentary series — as the movie’s narrator.
“The goal was to make it unassailable as possible with something that is still unknown, to take something out of the realm of myth into the realm of certainty,” says Barasch, a journalist who has served as an editor at the New Age Journal and Psychology Today. He is also CEO of Green World Ventures, which has worked in Nigeria, Ghana and now focuses in Kenya to develop a regenerative food industry.
Barasch has a long history both with documentary filmmaking and the field of UFOs. His work includes producing “One Child, One Voice,” a 1992 special designed to promote awareness of the Earth Summit in Brazil, and a 1995 episode of the documentary TV series “Secret History” on the alleged crash of an alien spacecraft in Roswell, N.M.
For “The Phenomenon,” Barasch says, he assisted Fox in taking years of footage about UFOs and UFO sightings to shape a narrative not just about UFOs, but the people who saw them, investigated them and knew about them.
The film shows case after case of people credibly describing seeing aircraft more technologically sophisticated than anything produced on Earth.
“These were far, far advanced from anything in our military capability,” Barasch says, adding that the crafts were described as moving as a rate of speed that would obliterate a human pilot.
“We are and have been visited by craft that are not of earthly manufacture,” he says.
The original plan was for the documentary to be released and shown in AMC theaters, Barasch says. But like many film releases, it got scrapped due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The film is now available via digital download, and Barasch says it’s been doing well, thanks in no small part to the news about the formation of the Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force.
President Donald Trump was even asked about the task force in recent interviews and vowed to look into the matter.
Barasch says he’s proud of “The Phenomenon” not just as a film, but as a step forward in proving that there is life beyond Earth.
“I think this film is a breakthrough,” he says.
For more information about the film, visit thephenomenonfilm.com.
Amanda Cuda is a staff writer.
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