SIFF Sighting: MIRAGE MEN (Documentary; United Kingdom)

In the late 1940s, residents in the U.S. began reporting sightings of flying saucers—what would a few years later be referred to as Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs). Some were frightened by them; others fascinated.

A few decades later when World War II Veteran Paul Bennewitz began talking up the things he was seeing from his home in New Mexico, the NSA cruelly began messing with his mind. They sent him "encrypted" messages supposedly from aliens; planted "evidence" of spaceship crashes on land nearby his house and flat out told him that aircrafts which belonged to the military were really vehicles from other planets. Their games drove him crazy, making him such a laughing stock amongst his peers that no one would believe a word he said.

This was all justified because of a "counterintelligence" campaign meant to preserve secret technology that was in development nearby at the USAF base. And of course, the believers think it was an elaborate cover-up of actual alien evidence, but this documentary has several folks from all sides of the fence going on record to share their truths.

Though the presentation is engaging (archive footage spliced in with talking head interviews), the reality that one of our veterans (and who knows who else) was used as a sacrificial lamb in our government's counterintelligence ruse is hard to digest.

MIRAGE MEN will be shown at the 40th Seattle International Film Festival May 20 and 21. For tickets, go here.

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