By Robbie Graham Silver Screen Saucers
A historical epic based on the life of FBI director J. Edgar Hoover is headed for the big screen this November. Directed by Oscar winner Clint Eastwood and starring Leonardo DiCaprio, the movie will chronicle the rise to power and time in office of the legendary lawman and will also explore his closeted homosexuality.
What the movie - entitled J. Edgar - will surely not explore, however, is Hoover’s longstanding and well-documented interest in the UFO phenomenon. Documents released through the Freedom of Information Act show that the flying saucer fever that swept America during the summer of 1947 also reached as far as the Bureau’s headquarters and had Hoover himself in a sweat. He was particularly frustrated at his inability to get straight answers on the subject from the US Air Force, which he was convinced was keeping crucial UFO-related information from him.
In an FBI document dated 10 July, 1947, in response to a request from the Air Force that the Bureau assist in its flying saucer investigations, a hand-written note from Hoover reads:
“I would do it but before agreeing to it we must insist upon full access to discs recovered. For instance in the la. case the Army grabbed it and would not let us have it for cursory examination.”
A remarkable statement indeed in its unambiguous acknowledgement that – in the opinion of the FBI director at least – the US Army was already in possession of a flying disc.
Debate has raged for years in the UFO research community about the meaning of Hoover’s “la.” reference. The Roswell incident had occurred just days earlier in New Mexico – could this be what he was referring to? If so, why say “la.”? Some speculate that “la.” might be short for Los Alamos – as in Los Alamos laboratories – where wreckage from the Roswell crash(es) allegedly was sent for testing. It is also possible that Hoover was referring to an older and less well-known UFO incident: the 1942 ‘Battle of Los Angeles,’ in which one or more saucer-shaped objects hovered silently over LA for several hours, drawing heavy artillery fire from the US Army. Witnesses described the objects as being impervious to the Army’s shelling, but perhaps they were not quite so impervious as they appeared.
Whatever the precise meaning of Hoover’s note, his interest in the UFO issue was clear. A wealth of UFO documentation from the FBI’s own files is now freely available for the public to examine; it shows that the Bureau’s monitoring of the UFO phenomenon continued throughout Hoover’s four-decade reign as FBI head honcho. The full complexity of the FBI/UFO interplay is crisply elucidated by Nick Redfern in his book The FBI Files.
History may come to regard the aforementioned ‘flying disc’ document as one of the most significant Hoover ever signed. But will this – or any reference whatsoever to the UFO phenomenon – feature in Eastwood’s forthcoming movie? I wouldn’t hold your breath. Why? Because the UFO subject is missing from the pages of history as officially written. UFOs have been excised entirely from our official historical meta-narrative. It follows, then, that UFOs are also absent from Hollywood’s historical dramas. For the cinema-going UFOlogist, this absence is noticeable no more so than in movies dealing with heavyweight political figures, such as John F. Kennedy (JFK), Richard Nixon (Nixon), George W. Bush (W.), James Jesus Angleton (The Good Shepherd) – even Howard Hughes (The Aviator).
This December will see the release of the Margaret Thatcher biopic The Iron Lady, which also will undoubtedly give the UFO topic a wide berth. Thatcher, of course, was in office at the time of the famous Bentwaters UFO incidents, which involved the apparent landing on British soil of a structured craft of unknown origin and resulted in a large-scale cover-up involving the UK and US governments. On May 21, 1997, Thatcher told British researcher Georgina Bruni that, when it comes to UFOs, “You can’t tell the people.” She might have added: “And certainly not in an Oscar-worthy drama.”
To add the UFO element to fact-based political biopics in a pre-disclosure world would be to turn historical drama into sci-fi. But in a post-disclosure world, the inclusion of UFOlogical detail will seem only natural to filmmakers. Right now, the most significant chapter in modern history has yet to be explored by Hollywood creatives outside of the generic trappings of science-fiction. When disclosure finally comes, Tinseltown will have a field day.
