A new feature film revisits the infamous 1997 Phoenix Lights incident. It’s called “Star People,” and it tells the story of two fictional siblings whose lives were transformed the night those mysterious lights appeared in the night sky, prompting speculation that the Valley had been visited by extraterrestrials.
The siblings, Claire and Taylor, have a tumultuous home life, and in the aftermath of the sightings, their paths diverge. Claire dedicates her life to capturing photographic evidence of the lights, while Taylor gets caught up in drugs.
Decades later, a possible re-appearance of the lights reunites them for a frantic trip into the desert, where they’re forced to reckon with their past, and the other lives that have been shaped by the legend of the lights.
Adam Finberg wrote and directed “Star People" — it's in theaters now. He grew up in Phoenix, and while he didn’t see the Phoenix Lights himself, he knew people who did. He’s been intrigued ever since.
Finberg spoke more about it with The Show.
Full conversation
ADAM FINBERG: It always was a really interesting event to me in that there are a lot of ways to look at it for what it might be or might not be. I also have always connected my interests and other interests in space, too, as having a parallel to self-discovery. It's not all just about what's out there, but kind of also helping us understand ourselves on Earth and those around us.
And then, the other element that led to the story was my work about 10 years ago. I directed a documentary called “The Business of Recovery,” which was a look at the addiction treatment in the United States.
SAM DINGMAN: I'm really glad you brought this up, because this makes me think about what, for me, is kind of the core relationship in the film, which is the relationship between Claire and her brother Taylor.
Taylor is an addict. Claire is haunted by this memory that she has of seeing the Phoenix Lights when she was very young. And as we're watching the movie, Claire is wrestling with this thing that's outside of her, but feels like it's core to her ability to understand what's inside of her.
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DINGMAN: Whereas Taylor is having this struggle that he knows is with himself, he's almost wrestling to get the version of himself, that's inside of him, outside.
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FINBERG: Yeah, no. I'm glad you picked up on that. That was definitely very intentional. That they both had this sort of shared traumatic experience, but they both process it in very different ways. I mean, he self-medicated through substance abuse, and Claire self-medicated through this obsession. And that actually is based on some inexperience I had working on “The Business of Recovery.”
But if you don't get to the underlying trauma or whatever is causing that substance abuse or addiction, you just will shift to something else. So, for Claire, it was just that she had this issue that she was just ignoring and really not sort of reconciling. And so it was kind of turned into this obsession.
DINGMAN: One of the other issues that it seemed like you were interested in exploring here is online culture and the way that people leverage things like UFOs to get attention, but then maybe don't necessarily have a true conviction about what they're exploring. And a lot of this is embodied in the character of Justin, who's an influencer who Claire is sort of dating.
We see him on his web stream talking to his followers about how he's hoping he might get to see a UFO because he's going to accompany Claire on this photo shoot.
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DINGMAN: Talk about developing the character of Justin and what you were after there.
FINBERG: You know, Justin was actually the hardest character to kind of nail down because he wasn't shared with the same experience that Claire was. And ultimately, what made sense is that there had to be a shared connection to Claire, but yet very different motivations for it. But also capturing that he was very earnest.
DINGMAN: Yes.
FINBERG: In his misunderstanding of reality in a way — of truth.
DINGMAN: Yes. I'm glad you brought up that the earnestness because one of my favorite moments in the film, and I want to be careful and not give anything away here, but let's just say there's a moment where he comes to question his relationship with Claire, and he says to her, “I hope you find what you're looking for.”
And in the way he delivers that line, in my mind, it's clear that he has realized they're chasing different things. But that there's almost like a tinge of admiration on his part for how sincere her belief in whatever the Phoenix Lights might be are.
FINBERG: Yeah. The reality sort of hits the road for him because she travels the state and goes on these solo expeditions in the dark, in the desert, and you know, he had never done any of those things.
DINGMAN: And that makes me think about one of the other core characters in the film, which is Ricardo, who is an Ecuadorian migrant who Claire and Taylor and Justin encounter in their attempt to get this photograph of the lights.
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DINGMAN: Ricardo's story is such a potent anchor for me. What made you want to have that element be part of this UFO story?
FINBERG: You know, growing up in Arizona, there always were stories about migrants and people dying in the desert and the lengths that people would go just to escape violence or find a better life. And being an Arizona story, it kind of made the most sense to ground it in another character who was also lost, but not lost in the sort of metaphysical sense — like physically lost in the desert — whereas Claire is lost in a different way.
DINGMAN: Can you talk a little bit about the role that drugs play in the story? Because it's not just that they are a demon that Taylor is wrestling with. They are sort of this menace that haunts the entire region and that has touched the lives of the characters in a lot of different ways.
FINBERG: I felt like it was impossible to tell a story that was supposed to take place at that border, and not somehow have that be a part of it. And as Taylor's character developed, it sort of made sense that there would be some sort of unspoken parallel, because he was obviously using a lot of drugs. And then there's people that are smuggling them in. There's an interesting story to be told about why they even come across the border in the first place — that, like, Americans are demanding them.
DINGMAN: Right.
FINBERG: I just felt that that angle had to be a part of a story that talked about migrants and also talked about some of the hypocrisies.
DINGMAN: Yes, yes. You're invoking an interesting idea there that so many people, when they think of UFOs, think of this mysterious force that we don't understand that takes control of our bodies and causes us to have these uncanny experiences, which is also what drugs do. And one of those problems we can't ultimately understand, but one we can if we would just put in the effort.
FINBERG: Yeah, it's a problem that is only grown. I mean, substance abuse and the kind of the way we treat it, it has not kind of been taken on really by our leaders. It does kind of come back to the way we approach helping each other.
