Continuity mistake: The film starts in Muncie Indiana. There is a scene in the hills near the town. There are NO hills near Muncie, it's flat as a board. (00:24:30)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
Ending / spoiler
Directed by: Steven Spielberg
Starring: Lance Henriksen, Richard Dreyfuss, Teri Garr
There is no deadly epidemic. That's a cover up to keep everyone away from the place where the aliens will arrive and communicate. The aliens communicate with humans at Devil's Tower (the reason why Richard Dreyfuss made that big dirt "mountain", his fascination with that shape, etc.). The little kid is reunited with his mom. Richard Dreyfuss boards an alien ship and leaves with them.
Replicant
More mistakes in Close Encounters of the Third Kind
David Laughlin: We didn't choose this place! We didn't choose these people! They were invited!
Claude Lacombe: They belong here more than we.
Trivia: After this movie, young Cary Guffey got to play the part of an alien himself - in the Italian movies "Uno Sceriffo extraterrestre - poco extra e molto terrestre" (English title: "The Sheriff and the Satellite Kid", 1979) and its sequel "Chissà perché. capitano tutte a me" ("Everything Happens To Me", 1980); both with the Italian actor Bud Spencer.
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Answer: It wasn't definitively answered, but it appears the aliens took people in order to learn more about humans. It's unclear if all those who were returned had originally gone willingly, but the intent was not to keep them indefinitely or harm them, and they were returned to Earth, albeit many decades later. At the end, after the aliens had made contact, a new group of humans, including Roy, went with them voluntarily.
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