Hello ladies and gentlemen, Muldoon here with some thoughts on a rather intriguing film, MIRAGE MEN, which circles around the possibility of UFO’s visiting us here on earth and the implications that come with that: how the US Intelligence community might be using the phenomena to their advantage to decieve us all.
Roswell, New Mexico. If you’re unfamiliar with why this city is important, I don’t want to know you. But (like most folks out there) if you’ve heard the story a million times and have had your ears filled up with all sorts of conspiracy theories surrounding that event, then you’re well prepped to sit down for this film. No, this film’s not specifically about Roswell, but about something much bigger and ultimately more unnerving: the idea of “Mirage Men” working for various branches of our government who’s primary directive is to muddy up the water of confidential operations and help perpetuate the UFO phenomena.
The film beautifully leads you down a path of unnerving ideas and concepts, one which will leave you trusting no one. “I want to believe!” Hell, it’s an exciting concept to pursue the idea that we are being visited by creatures from other worlds and that our government is covering their visitations up. Personally, I’ve read countless books about the subject (Whitley Streiber’s COMMUNION being that initial thread to pull.) And sure enough, if you travel down that path, you’re sure to come across names like Art Bell, Betty and Barney Hill, or Dr. Hopkins and his alleged MIB encounter, along with countless other names and people who claim to have that one golden nugget of truth. For every “credible” extraterrestrial researcher out there, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of nut job wackos with bizarre claims (Reptilians anyone?). What if one of those "nut jobs" actually was on to something, just the wrong thing? What if they stumbled upon something the government didn't want public? You can't just kill a man for seeing something he wasn't supposed to see (*debatable), but you can discredit them and build up their beliefs like a third leg - only to kick it out from under them and sit back while everyone laughs. The thing is, the belief in alien visitation is exactly the same thing as a belief in a given religion. It all comes down to faith in something you can’t definitively prove. “Faith” isn’t something to mess with as has been illustrated throughout human history. Just think: how many wars can we credit to faith/religion? How many deaths? How many mutilations in the name of something otherworldly? To control that in a person, what they hold to be true despite hard evidence proving the contrary, that’s the key; that’s real power and that’s exactly what this film is about. It’s about the manipulation of information and my word is it interesting.
The film primarily focuses on a Mr. Doty, an ex-member of the Air Force (principle interview for the film) who shares all sorts of stories, citing a handful of people as examples, of how it was his job to feed into such individuals’ *delusions about UFO’s in order to discredit them as a way to hide actual government secrets that they had somehow stumbled upon, like a pilot's eyeful of a crashed test drone years before they were announced. It was his job to cloud the mind of these folks, give them tidbits of clues, and nudge them in a direction that would ultimately drive them crazy and easily throw them off the scent of actual confidential cases.
The movie’s a real head trip and I can’t help but give that up to the film’s editors, Roland Denning and Kypros Kyprianou, as they treat the audience much like the mirage men did the UFO believers. The film is like a conspiracy pool where the further you get in the deeper it all becomes. It’s an insightful film that dives deep into the alien conspiracy culture and provides just one more thing to consider in regards to alien visitors beaming down to our planet.
The concept of your government withholding information or deliberately lying to its people is nothing new and nothing shocking, but what’s presented in this film, the level and degree to which they’re reporting is absolutely sobering and will send shivers down your spine. I found the information presented in MIRAGE MEN very disturbing and illuminating at the same time.
In case you can’t tell, I was glued to my seat for the entirety of this doc, an affect most docs rarely have on me. I’d put this one right up there with THE IMPOSTER, and any given Morgan Spurlock film. It’s good. I’d recommend it to friends (in fact I told my roommate all about it already), and I would suggest you give it a shot if you happen to get the chance. Also, be sure to check out the film’s website as well if you’re looking for more info!
- Mike McCutchen
"Muldoon"
Mike@aintitcool.com
