Spielberg (2017)

Simply A Masterpiece

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

Yo, there's no way for me to review this film without saying, take your *insert ethnicity + "ass" here* to see this film,like now. You have to see it in order to know what you're really messing with.

It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

Steven Spielberg has always been open about himself in interviews, about his work and life. So there is very little that is new in this documentary apart from Spielberg doing some second unit directing work in Scarface (1983.)This is a long documentary looking at Spielberg's rise as a director. Sneaking into Universal Studios, starting in television and then moving into movies. He quickly establishing himself as a wunderkind with Jaws and Close Encounters of the Third Kind and then made the (then) biggest film of all time with ET.However it does come across as too much of a celebratory backslapping promotional piece with friends, families, collaborators, actors and fellow directors. There is the bit in the documentary where everyone wondered how they could produce realistic dinosaurs for Jurassic Park. They went down to see Dennis Muren who showed what he had in his computer and they jumped with joy with what they saw. That is Dennis Muren who previously worked with Spielberg, is an ace special effects supremo who works for George Lucas's company ILM. I have a fair idea they knew what to expect.There is very little by way of criticism here apart from the failure of his comedy 1941. Nothing about the reasons for the failure of his first marriage to Amy Irving, the relative failure of Dreamworks or even the difficulties he has these days of getting his film projects funded.

(RATING: ☆☆☆☆ out of 5) GRADE: B THIS FILM IS RECOMMENDED.IN BRIEF: An well crafted but bias love-fest about this great director.SYNOPSIS: A document that celebrates the films of Mr. Spielberg. David Lean's Lawrence of Arabia inspired him to become a director. As a teenager, filmmaking kept "those scary whispers" from starting up, providing him a security that life itself could not deliver. His use of close-ups, stationary angles, fluid camera movement, personal storytelling, and quick cuts established his unique style. His sanitized view of suburbia and the Americana, his sentimental view of nostalgia, and his love of childhood and family can be found in most of his films. This is Steven Spielberg. And Susan Lacy's well made documentary examines this legendary filmmaker with much skill (and just too much adoration).The documentary gives us all the facts about this great director using archival footage, interviews with friends and associates, and snippets of his many movies. Turned down from USC film school, he snuck off the tour bus on Universal Studios and observed directors like Hitchcock at work. He later worked at that studio as a first time director gaining knowledge and experience by creating television episodes and movies before his big blockbuster summer hit, Jaws, changed the film industry forever.Using his own personal experiences and his avid love of cinema encouraged him to explore many genres: sci-fi (Close Encounters of the Third Kind, E.T., A.I. Minority Report), war movies (Saving Private Ryan, Schindler's List, Empire of the Sun, War Horse) horror (Jurassic Park, Jaws), adventure (Duel, Raiders of the Lost Ark, The Adventures of Tintin), historical biographies (Lincoln, the underrated Bridge of Spies), even comedies (1941, Always, The Terminal).Spielberg delves into his beginnings very effectively. Upset with some critics' assertion that he was primarily a successful commercial and mainstream filmmaker, Mr. Spielberg took up the challenge and created films on more serious subjects such as racism (Amistad, The Color Purple), terrorism and 9/11 (Munich, War of the Worlds), and genocide (the aforementioned Schindler's List). This documentary spend a great deal of time on one of his greatest achievements about the Holocaust ever made, with numerous segments from that Academy Award winning film. Ms. Lacy's film, though well researched, purposely skips over some of his lesser works and allows Mr. Spielberg himself to sidestep his early personal life with the former Mrs. S. (Amy Irving). Yet it still manages to flaunt his happy marriage with his current spouse (Kate Capshaw) and his now happy family life.Directors Martin Scorsese, George Lucas, Francis Coppola, J.J. Abrams, and Brian DePalma were his friends and creative rivals and their comments in interviews add great insight to the technical aspects of this man. In fact, the point is made numerous times that his films dealing with technology advancements were living examples of state-of-the-art filmmaking themselves. (CGI use in Jurassic Park, Minority Report, A I., War of the Worlds, Close Encounters, etc. elevated the bar in cinematic terms) The documentary is always entertaining with special moments to savor: Spielberg's own reminiscences of filming of his two masterworks, Saving Private Ryan, and Schindler's List, cinematographer Janusz Kaminski discussing his camera work with fascinating details in conjunction with the director's vision on the latter epic, scenes of him directing a young Drew Barrymore and Henry Thomas on the E.T. set that are very insightful and gives us a glimpse of his extraordinary technique as a director. The director himself gives due credit to his artisan family who are his crew for many movies, including composer John Williams. However, his personal life and hardships are glossed over such as his first marriage and divorce and his film duds are rarely acknowledged (Hook, The BFG, his comedies).The film becomes a love-fest rather than a serious chronicle of an artist. It continuously lauds him. Janet Maslin, Todd McCarthy, J. Hoberman, and A. O. Scott analyze his films with much admiration. Leonardo DiCaprio, Daniel Day Lewis, Jeff Goldblum, Tom Cruise, Tom Hanks, Liam Neeson, Ralph Fiennes, Oprah Winfrey, and Ben Kingsley speak eloquently of working with him. Yet, except for his estrangement with his father, there are no warts at all in this depiction of Mr. Spielberg and that becomes a bit of the problem for such a flattering documentary. One wishes would have could have shown a more balanced vision of this immensely talented man with at least a margin of human error, but that does not exist in The World of Spielberg. Just as some of his films rely too heavily on uplifting and positive viewpoints, so does this documentary and that prevents this film from becoming a great work of art about a great director. Perhaps the subject himself could not give up complete control to Ms. Lacy to make an completely honest portrait of an artist.Still, while the documentary shows this visionary director in the best of light, with little shading, it also shows us some of the best films of the last 40 years that emerged from a master craftsman who celebrates "pure movie-making". Spielberg is a fine testament about one man whose love for the movies made the world a better place.

If you Love Steven's work you will love this documentary. I am a fan and really appreciate the opportunity of getting to know the man and his motivation for doing the brilliant films he has made so far. I didn't love all his movies, actually through this documentary I realize I haven't seen some of his earlier films. But if I have to mention by heart movies that have deeply touched me, either for a really fun time, horror or drama, Spielberg will be at the top of my list. Here you get to see the man behind the legend. and I personally got to like him as a person even more.

This documentary does a good job of analyzing Steven Spielberg's film career. It is in rough chronological order, but not exact chronological order. For example the film starts out with "Jaws" (1975) and comes back to Steven's film directorial debut with "Duel" (1971) later.It goes into details about his home life only when it is relevant to his work as filmmaker, and it is apparently relevant a great deal. The audience knows this because it is Steven Spielberg himself who contributes the most to the commentary. Apparently Steven has a great gift - he has retained a vivid memory of what it was like to be a child all of these years later. That explains why he made some of the films he did, and how he worked with children and could show the viewpoint of children so well. Spielberg talks about how he has had the same team of professionals working with him on films for years, some since the 70s, and he pays tribute particularly to composer John Williams.It does go into some of his failures, though only briefly. Apparently he considers "1941" (1979) a failure, and I guess I can see how coming off one hit after another in the mid to late 70s he might feel that way.Many of the actors and actresses that have starred in his film are almost giddy with praise, and I guess we should expect that, but that is countered with Spielberg's criticism of his own work, which is very insightful.The best stories: the pandemonium and the overruns in time and money on the set of "Jaws", and how Steven Spielberg, the perennial C student, could not get into USC film school no matter what he tried, so in 1968 he simply trespassed on the Universal lot, found a vacant office and took up residency, and began to go on different sets learning how professional directors practiced their craft. He was even thrown off the set of a Hitchcock film once! However, it was six months before anyone even challenged his presence at Universal, and even then he ended up with a seven year contract directing for Universal TV. Things and security have certainly changed in 50 years! I'd highly recommend this work to anybody who wants the story of Spielberg's career from the mouth of the subject himself. 147 minutes seems like a long documentary, but for me the time just flew by.