National Film Vault

FILM NOTES

Universal Pictures released E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial in June 1982, directed by Steven Spielberg at the height of his commercial and creative powers. The film became the highest-grossing release of its time, displacing Star Wars, and remains a defining work of the New Hollywood era — a science-fiction film built around domestic intimacy rather than spectacle. Its cultural footprint has only deepened across four decades.

This cell, titled E.T. by the operator, captures three continuous 35mm frames from an interior scene lit by warm fireplace glow. The dark foreground and mid-ground figures are consistent with the film's quieter household sequences, and a sunflower prop is visible in the lower right of the third frame. The strip is oriented upside-down relative to standard viewing, a common artifact of how frames are extracted from a reel.