The "Alien Autopsy" footage has been generally dismissed as a fraud, largely because none of the original footage was laboratory dated. In April of 1995, Ray Santilli approached me with the idea of my writing a book about the saga of the discovery of the film.
I telephoned Kodak and was told that they needed about a foot of film, and that they could establish the date of manufacture. Santilli failed to provide the needed film strip, and I dropped the project.
UFO investigator Bob Schell has been pursuing the matter with more success, and some very surprising results. Kodak initially told him that they only needed one frame to test. When he offered a frame for testing, he was told that they needed fifty frames. He then got Santilli and his partner Volker Spielberg to agree to supply a fifty-frame strip. At this point, Kodak said they needed sixteen feet.
Kodak representatives have promised Schell documentation about the dating process, but have never sent him anything. A piece of the film was tested independently, and was identified as being one of three types of acetate manufactured by Kodak. Kodak would not comment on this.
A chemical engineer from another film manufacturer commented that only a tiny piece of footage would be necessary to verify the age. At the present time (12/96) an attempt is being made to get this manufacturer to analyze the film that is presently available.
Whitley's Comment: Nobody has ever decisively debunked the Santilli/Spielberg footage. There remains a good deal of reason to think that it may be genuine, and this latest effort by Bob Schell might advance that process.