Spielberg: The Magic Is Long Gone
by John NolteThere were two Hollywood-related moments that gladdened the heart over this past weekend. The first, obviously, was the glorious sight of the Oscar telecast end credits, the second was Kim Master’s “Slate” story reporting that Steven Spielberg’s long gestating passion project – an Abe Lincoln biopic, is all but dead. Steven Spielberg not making a film was good news. How things have changed in thirty years.
Anyone my age, anyone who was around ten years-old when “Jaws” hit theatres, remembers when the name “Spielberg” meant something magical. From childhood straight through to my mid-twenties, Spielberg was what the joy of movies was all about. Not only did he direct four of the greatest films in the history of American cinema: “Jaws,” “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” “Raiders of the Lost Ark” and “E.T.,” but as a producer his name was attached to such crowd pleasers as “Used Cars,” “Poltergeist,” “Gremlins,” “The Goonies,” “Innerspace,” “Who Framed Roger Rabbit,” and the “Back to the Future” trilogy.
To say the least, this was quite a run and then in 1993 he achieved something no other filmmaker of his generation ever came close to. He brought to the screen both the ultimate popcorn thrill-ride with “Jurassic Park” and a full-blown masterpiece with “Schindler’s List.”
At this point Spielberg had nowhere to go but down, and down he went. Whether or not he’s lost a bit of his filmmaking mojo is for another debate. The issue here is one of moral maturity.
My disenchantment with Spielberg began about 90-minutes into “Saving Private Ryan,” a film that treats the American soldier with respect, but refused to acknowledge the country that produced that soldier. It’s Tom Sizemore’s sympathetic character who speaks the film’s theme out loud:
“But another part of me thinks that if by some miracle we stay and actually make it out of here. Some day we might look back on this and decide that saving Private Ryan was the one decent thing we were able to pull out of this whole God awful shitty mess….”
That “God awful shitty mess” is WWII and no one – not the characters, not the film itself — argues that maybe another “decent thing we were able to pull out” was saving the world at a terrible cost to both ourselves and our allies.
Then there’s “Munich,” a film so morally illiterate in its examination of Israel’s right to protect itself, you would never believe the same individual created “Schindler’s List.”
And finally, let’s not forget Spielberg’s willingness to help China put a fairytale Olympic facade on a country with one of the worst human rights records in modern history. It was only a very public shaming started by Mia Farrow that put an end to that nonsense. The Commie bad guys in “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Worst Sequel Without The Word ‘Boogaloo’ in the Title” were make believe. He should be so offended by real ones.
We should be pleased Spielberg may not get to make his Lincoln biopic because his moral blindness makes it impossible to understand an individual as complex and historic as Abraham Lincoln, a man willing to go so far as to destroy America in order to save it. The essence of Lincoln was that he was driven by the knowledge that without America the world was doomed, and so he would preserve it at any cost. If you can’t grasp that, you can’t grasp Lincoln, and Useful Idiots for Communist countries are immediately suspect. That “Munich” screenwriter Tony Kushner, who has made some outrageously negative statements about Israel, is credited with having written the “Lincoln” script is beyond comprehension.
Who would have ever guessed that a man — second only to Walt Disney — once associated with the purest joys of escapism and the pinnacle of pure filmmaking, is now associated with the very worst of modern day Hollywood. No one can take the magic out of your name. You can only give it away.
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204 Comments
“But another part of me thinks that if by some miracle we stay and actually make it out of here. Some day we might look back on this and decide that saving Private Ryan was the one decent thing we were able to pull out of this whole God awful shitty mess….”
See, this is what happens when you lock your writers up for so long they just start free associating on paper.
Wow! He was truly a genius. What happened?
I'd like to see Eastwood take on a Lincoln bio – I think he could do a fine job. And he's about the only current director I'd say that about.
What do you suppose motivated this moral malignancy? His projects were indeed a joy to behold at one time.
Yeah it is ironic a liberal Democrat believes he knows how to do justice to the Republican Party's founder.
Like you, I greatly respect the man who directed Jaws and Close Encounters, brought Indiana Jones onto the screen, produced Back to the Future and Who Framed Roger Rabbit etc. and adore his work, but I'm both anxiously curious and extremely terrified on who Lincoln can adapt. Especially if it'll try to compare link today's leader with Lincoln and all the unbearable diatribe.
Oh well. At least Liam Neeson is in it.
Chris Nolan. He made a pretty good film this year about how one man is willing to be hated by the people he's trying to save.
Yeah it is ironic a liberal Democrat believes he knows how to do justice to the Republican Party's founder.
Like you, I greatly respect the man who directed Jaws and Close Encounters, brought Indiana Jones onto the screen, produced Back to the Future and Who Framed Roger Rabbit etc. and adore those works, but I'm both anxiously curious and extremely terrified on how Lincoln will adapt. Especially if it'll try to compare/link today's current leader with Lincoln and all that unbearable diatribe.
Oh well. At least Liam Neeson is in it.
*Edited for grammar errors*
Mr. Spielberg had a hand in "Band of Brothers", which I feel is an enormously important work. I worry, though, that this year's "The Pacific" might be colored by the post 9/11 lefty worldview. Let's hope not.
Yes! It is true. But I think it has been apparent that this man has always been morally corrupt. He is a greedy man who has used media to build an artificial idea of an idealized person that is quite removed from the corrupt person that he truly is. I am glad to see some holes poked in the pomposity of this clearly arrogant individual!
Hey, at least he's got to have enough dough left from his golden years to be able to pay all the taxes the Obamunist demands. It's up to Spielberg and Oprah now.
I think Spielberg movies have points when they should end, but they keep going, and going, and going… WAIT A MINUTE… can you imagine the merchandising that could go into an Energizer Bunny movie!!!! $$$
SIZEMORE: “But another part of me thinks that if by some miracle we stay and actually make it out of here. Some day we might look back on this and decide that saving Private Ryan was the one decent thing we were able to pull out of this whole God awful shitty mess….”
No one in the war talked like this. It's a lazy reliance on a convention established by Vietnam dramas.
When he says "we", he means humankind. See, it wasn't the Germans who committed the atrocities and ignited a global war. It was HUMANKIND. Of which we are apart, which means we — Americans — are not above taking some ownership for the whole "awful shitty mess".
Thank you, Spielburg. We'll continue to cast blame where it's due, while you encourage the enemies of civilization.
He seems to think he needs Bollywood or Disney partnerships and funding. All he needs is a subject and a camera. Is he afraid he can't just tell a story?
I don't need all the special effects and bells and whistles to be entertained. I think my favorite was "Duel".
Shortly after the release of Schindler's List there was a big, near-violent antisemitic rally in Oakland, California. CNN showed the full panoply of antisemitic signs and "Hitler didn't do enough" commentary by the African-American students behind the demonstration. A few hours later, CNN re-appeared with a sanitized version of the demonstrations, complete with Steven Spielberg talking about how it was a misunderstanding, and that he must have failed to get the right message across. Huh? It was as if he was saying "I'm sorry my Jewishness offends you, I'll try to do better in the future." I've never trusted him since.
Thumbs down for double posts, sorry but you suck at life big time.
Yeah that Eastwood is a nice fellow. Fun times.
If slightly different version of my comments are appearing, it's because I'm getting a "This comment is currently in moderation" message. Usually, as in this post, the comment eventually disappears entirely. I don't think I've done anything to be blocked, so I'm guessing it's another glitch in the new and growing blog. It seems to happen about every other comment. Anybody else had this problem?
Everyone makes Lincoln out to be such a hero and Emancipator…
From from Lincoln's second debate with Stephen Douglas, on August 27, 1858:
"I will say, then, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races- that I am not , nor have ever been, in favor of making voters or jurors of Negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which prevents them from living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man, am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race"
People- stop deifying Lincoln~
I haven't seen Munich but friends who did were disgusted. Apparently Spielberg had one of the Israeli commandos displaying remorse for what he had done. This is quite disgusting coming from the man who directed Schindler's List. Spielberg knows the Israeli commandos had absolutely no remorse for ridding the world of the paleostinian vermin that murdered their olympians; they were proud of what they did as was Israel, as were most civilized people around the world. I'm sure the bedwetting leftist quislings wept when the filthy primitive 7th century Mohammedan throat cutters got what they deserved.
Lincoln. Meh.
Two wrongs don't make a right.
My guess is that it's a combination of success and marinating in the liberal Hollywood culture for many years. It takes a strong sense of self to withstand that combo.
The fact that Showtime's The United States of Tara was Speilberg's brain child is proof enough that the idea well has run dry. Seriously Stephen? A dramady about a house wife with "wacky" multiple personalities? That's what you're peddling these days?
Eastwood made Flags of Our Fathers which seemed to say "What was the point of WWII?". I like him, but a lot of his recent films except the last two, were very nihilistic and kind of pointless. The last two weren't exactly upbeat either.
The first 2/3 of Munich are great. Then the last third gets bogged down with hand wring moral relativism BS. Daniel Craig is great as a gung ho mossad agent. Eric Bana is great too. But he's the lead guy who decides he can't take it anymore and quits. Spielberg claims in his intro it is not an anti-Israel movie, but it does seem to have the same logic as the anti-war Bush haters, that all war is bad and unjustified. Stupid.
I'm not commenting on either yours or J.J.Smith's comments. Except to say that the duplicate post may be related to the query I posted, below. I wrote a comment. Got a "your comment is being moderated" message. That one disappeared entirely. So I wrote another version of the same comment. Got the same message. Only this time it actually posted. No rhyme, no reason. So try to be a little understanding towards double-posters until Big Hollywood gets this glitch fixed. They're probably not doing it intentionally.
Motley Crue does still rock.
He just wants to remain relevant.
Yep.
boston,
You suck at life big time??? How the h#ll old are you? So he double posted, so what? This is a slightly screwy system, where posts do double post, or disappear for seemingly no reason.
JJ,
Sign up for the intense debate feature at the bottom of the page, it makes it easier, and then you can edit.
Not Speilberg news, but have ya'll heard about the movie "Fair game"?
Sean Penn as Joe Wilson & Naomi Watts as Valerie Plame?
Washington (ANI): Oscar winner Sean Penn is in talks to star in Fair Game based on the real life of CIA agent Valerie Plame. Naomi Watts has been roped in to play the lead while Penn is in negotiations to star as Ambassador Joseph Wilson. [...]
http://tinyurl.com/dylfbv
**
Richard Armitage? Uh… never heard of him.
All true quotations. And almost ALL of which Lincoln and then Lincoln's followers in the Republican Party would either break, dance around or outright recant between Emancipation and Reconstruction.
In other news: President Obama is "against" gay marriage. He said so. Show of hands as to who thinks he'd be signing an ammendment to that end?
Lawhawk,
Yeah, about half of my posts seem to go to moderation, even though they do not contain anything off-color or epithets. In fact, I just mentioned that the blog had issues, upthread. I had forgotten about Spielberg doing the CNN deal, thank you for reminding. And I agree, why would we have any faith in his good intentions, after that display?
Err.. just to be clear (stupid tone-of-voice-negating-internet) I would regard BOTH instances of futzing the truth as the right thing to do, naturally.
You do understand that just by posting that one portion of Lincoln's speech, it doesn't mean anything, right? It says nothing about him, en toto.
Thinking back on Spielberg's "Munich"… can anyone explain to me HOW a Jew can be an Israel hating Jew? How can he be in love with Palestinians and hate his own? I mean it seems to me that if you are a Jew you are a Jew above all else. It is not only a religious affiliation (not to minimize that), but it is who you are. Your essence. Please. It confounds me. I am not saying he should hate Palestinians, but what the hell?
The problem with Spielberg is that he desperately, terribly craves acceptance and approval of the "In Crowd" of DC politicos and Media taste-makers. So he will adopt any fashion, viewpoint, moral equivalency, to win their approval. This is true of most of Hollywood.
John Wayne, Jimmy Stewart, John Ford, and Humprhey Bogar, men with disparate politics and ideas, certainly did not give a damn about what people thought of them outside of seeing their movies.
Clint Eastwood? He trashed the Marines at Iwo, cast the Japanese there as noble warriors (there is a scene in one film where Japanese soldiers tenderly care for a wounded Marine, in real life they tortured and beheaded them). He is just like Spielberg.
Lincoln? A great man, one of the greatest Presidents, but a man with 19th Century views on Blacks, slavery, and many other things. By degrees, he came round to deciding to free all the slaves.
He was of course the opposite of Obama, saying exactly what he meant. While he is known as the Great Emancipator, his views on Blacks would shock modern audiences, as would most men and women's views of the 19th Century, even Black figures such as Frederick Douglass himself. It's a mistake to assume people thought or believed in the same things centuries ago as they do today.
But three do.
This is great.
Wait till Hollywood gets a load of the current regime (the hope bunch).
So far they have told China that human rights won't get in the way of business. Then they told Israel to pound sand, and leave Palestine alone, oh and hey, here is 800 millin to buy more rockets to launch at Israel.
I think a lot of his stuff is hokey. Some of it is brilliant. I loved Empire of the Sun for instance. But the latest Indiana Jones movie was a mess.
I hope Andrew and his IT guys are monitoring this.
Gee, I'll take Spielberg over Nolte any day. Oh by the way, who is John Nolte? Probably the same type of critic who voted "Shakespeare In Love" over "Saving Private Ryan" as the best picture of the year. Spare us your elitest nonsense.
Schindler’s List had one nice opportunity to acknowledge America, and it failed to do so. In one of the last scenes, they show Amon Goth (the dispicable Nazi officer played by Ralph Fiennes) being hung at the concentration camp, apparently by Soviet soldiers. In reality, as the war ended Goth fled to Germany and was captured by the UNITED STATES ARMY. The film could have had a ten-second scene where Goth came face to face with a seasoned squad of US soldiers – that could have been one of the highlights of the movie. He was extradited to Poland and executed by the Poles. Spielberg chose to imply that the Soviets captured Goth. Gee, do you think that was accidental?
Too right, Nolte. I would have kicked the tv screen when I played "Munich" but it was my tv and somehow I just didn't see Spielberg paying the damned bill for a new one. Ditto with that nihilism of 'Saving Private Ryan'. And that screenplay of the 'Crystal Skull' was so moronic, an 8th grader with a crayon could have scribbled a better plot. Lord, Spielberg has lost it. He's gone from making films to making sermons. And the faith he's preaching isn't something a moralistic human could possibly believe in.
Uh – who are you? Listen, sweetie, if you want to whack your rattle over someone's head, crawl your elitist little knees over to the HuffPo. They simply adore your 'type'.
This revisionist nonsense over "Private Ryan" — that "We wuz robbed!" mentality — is a bore. Harvey Weinstein may have been & will forever be a bulldozing promoter of his films, but "Shakespeare in Love" was a terrific story, well-acted by all, and wonderfully written. There was a notion at the time that "the writers" finally had their way with a Best Picture choice, and I think that may have been true.
The first 30 minutes of "Ryan" were profound and shocking and memorable — the rest was a marvelously filmed redux of 1940s war movies (same "diverse" company of men) with a 1960s mentality. Ex.: Would Spencer Tracy/Errol Flynn/Greg Peck et al. ever have revealed their civilian occupation to their men, as Hanks finally did?
Nice, nice post, John.
Have you actually seen Duel?
He was bothered by the truck because it kept trying to run him off the road, for no apparent reason. And it was re-released because it was a really good film. Speilberg's first, if I remember right.
Sorry. Gwyneth Paltrow, aka Fishsticks is a terrible actress. She didn't deserve the Oscar, especially over someone like Judi Dench.
Thanks John, nice column.
I think it's clear that Spielberg lacks the directoral skill to handle a project like Lincoln. His recent forays into "character rich" stories (like AI, Amistad, Munich, the Terminal) have been so superficial that I truly doubt he's capable of creating whole characters in his movies anymore. There is no way he could present a realistic picture of Lincoln, a complex man to be sure. I'm afraid the film would feel more like a history channel docu-drama or, God-forbid, an action movie like Indiana Jones/Crystal Skull (why did he animate that one? I just don't get it?).
Moreover, his ever increasing tendency to interpret all of his movies through his oddly defeatist, far left political filter, makes me doubt he could give an honest presentation. In fact, I can see him at the press conference now trying to explain why Lincoln sounds so much like Obama by claiming that he had to modernize Lincoln and that he looked to Lincoln's essence.
Finally, I don't want to see a civil war film where all the soldiers are running around holding large radio handsets instead of guns.
I think you put your finger on something with King. King had some great early books, but hasn't had a creative thought in years. It's like he sits at home these days watching horror movies and then says, "I can do that using my standard characters and cliches." I suspect that most people who "create" for a living eventually just run out of fresh ideas. I think Spielberg hit that point years ago. Add in that he's decided that every film now needs to have political meaning and you have a receipe for poor filmage.
Excellent point.
Do any of Spielberg's "uplifting" or "heroic" movies paint America or any American institutions as heroic or noble or special?
Thanks Vince. I would agree that it shoulda been Dench over Hunt.
Paltrow played a young woman, playing a young man, playing a young woman. I thought she was terrific. The fact that I wouldn't choose her as a FaceBook buddy has nothing to do with her engaging performance. (neither, um, does the fact that I'm not on FaceBook)
I also loved Cate Blanchett as Elizabeth that year. It was a tough call and I would've been fine with either choice.
Heh, the character in the film must be in touch with all the Americans who say they are American and then go and rip apart everything that this country stands for.
Unfortunately, it seems to require an early-morning sneak attack on American soil for the peacenik half of the country to get on board with doing what needs to be done.
I have liked Steven Spielberg over the years. Yes he is to the left but he doesn't hit you over the head with it like some of those yahoos. I thought Schindler's List was a Masterpiece – and Private Ryan should have had more recognition than it got. From the GI's point of view war is just a daily fight for survival and looking after your buddies. That's the angle he showed.
But I agree in the last few years….
Maybe after 35 years he is just getting tired.
The U.S. food drop near the end of Empire of the Sun is about the only such incident I can think of in a Spielberg film.
I remind you that, before it was PC-sanitized, E.T.: The Extraterrestrial had American government officials pointing guns at kids. And I suspect he chose to edit that scene not because it cast the CIA (or FBI or whoever the hell they were supposed to be) in a bad light, but because kids were being threatened. Granted, it was in bad taste and he may have been in the right to fix it (though I personally don't agree), but it was in bad taste for more than one reason.
He should just adapt more Phil Dick stories like Minority Report. He can even be like the Matrix boys and rip off Dick's stories and not give him attribution if that's what makes him happy.
The problem, as I see it, is that Mr. Speilberg thinks he can re-write history. Most of us enjoy his product and it is excellent in its' presentation…No question about that…but I fully believe his brand of indocrtination is insidious…..he lures the viewer in with much 'glitz' and when he has them in his thrall he feeds inaccurate info at just the right time…he is brilliant…BUT I THINK WE ARE ON TO HIM…
CAUTION needs to be taken as my mom says…sort of like watching the THREE STOOGES…it is not real.
Thebutlerdidit • 50p
You do understand that just by posting that one portion of Lincoln's speech, it doesn't mean anything, right? It says nothing about him, en toto.
I think that in quoting Mr. Lincoln, the poster was trying to show that Mr. Speilberg would have to include this sort of rhetoric in his movie….I believe the opposite would happen..as Mr. Speilberg might be trying to remake Mr. Lincoln into an Obama type figure…..
Anyway…that is how I interpreted that post.
My take on Mr. Lincoln is that he was a racist by today's standards and did not see the races as equal….Mr. Speilberg wants to rewite history I fully believe.
It's self indulgence. Some successful artists get to a point where they don't know when they're making wrong choices, and no one is going to tell them when they're wrong. It's the reason why Stephen King doesn't believe he needs an editor, or Motley Crue thinks they can still rock.
I also think Spielberg is at a point where he feels above the "commonness" of absolute moral standards. To him, that's dehumanizing and reserved for ordinary folk. When that happens, you start losing the antagonism of a clashing conflict, and sapping conflict results in a lack of creative passion.
To this day, I'll never understand why Dennis Weaver was bothered by that truck. And why it was re-released as a feature film.
hah what could be more elitist than bashing Spielberg!
hey genius watch the kingdom of the crystal skull again. its actually an elaborate validation of intelligent design hidden behind a seemingly entertaining if mindless family adventure flick.-oh but you were too mad at spielberg for giving mosad agents a soul… that you cant enjoy spielberg films is punishment enough for your lack of understanding
AI, Munich, The Terminal, Minority Report, are all profoundly designed works of art. What do you do for fun read instruction manuals? All this talk of Speilberg being a leftist, yet my gut tells me you truly enjoyed The Reader (if/when you see it) a dangerous piece of leftist propaganda. This goes for the lot of you, your anti-Speilberg remarks are quite funny as true leftists like Godard and the inteligencia of Europe HATE Speilberg (but i suppose this all stems from the same place both left and right are plain playa hating.) Grow up people Speilberg did.
I'm not a peacenik, but it's not true that we only got involved in WWII after we were attacked.
In the Pacific, in mid-1941 the US formed a clandestine group (1st American Volunteer Corps) known as the Flying Tigers under General Claire Chennault to aid the Chinese air effort against the Japanese invasion, and FDR embargoed US oil imports to Japan, which the Japanese were heavily dependent on . . . . . in the European War, FDR created the "Lend-Lease" act to circumvent American law designed to prevent the US from providing aid to Germany's opponent and draw the US into the war.
With hindsight it would have been better if the US had entered the war sooner; but it's historically untrue to claim that the US only got involved in WW II after we were attacked. To some extent, FDR was engaging in policis designed to assure eventual American involvement in WW II regardless of Congress' intent.
Spielberg showed some inspiration in Minority Report. The whole "eye-change" scene had a remarkable Sir Alfred vibe to it. Outside of that, I find it hard to find anything worthy of mention. He did invent the whole "shaky-cam, sureal-realistic battle vibe" with Private Ryan – which has since been copped ad nauseum by his lessors like Greengrass.
It's puzzling how Lucas, Spielberg and DePalma managed to fall so hard. John Ford didn't lose his fastball. I guess it's just hunger. They lose that inner kid, the one who grew up in the Valley or in the middle class Jewish family, making home war movies in the backyard with friends and the reel-to-reel. The one who made movies in their head, not on their Mac.
I think it was the author of this post who noted Spielberg's own words, when he spoke before some collection of Hollywood celeb at one of the multitudinous award crocks, and stated that they were who he was making movies for. That's probably all the explanation we need.
IMHO it's not just Spielberg – back in the 1960s and 1970s and 1980s and early 1990s, there used to be 2-5 Hollywood movies every year that I really enjoyed seeing: The Sting, The Sound of Music, The Graduate, The Godfather, American Graffiti, Rocky, Star Wars, Forrest Gump, E.T, Jaws, The Exorcist, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Mary Poppins, Ghostbusters, Groundhog Day, Butch Cassidy, Beverly Hills Cop, Back to the Future, Ghost, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, etc. Great stories, wonderful fun and entertainment from start to finish.
What do we get these days: Milk, Che, W, Frost/Nixon, Brokeback Mountain, Capote, and the like.
Makes me wonder if the great directors and producers of Hollywood think that they have to make politically correct message movies to impress their friends and win awards?
Me, I see enough reality in my life every day – I'm not going to pay high theater prices for unappreciated morality lectures – whatever happened to fun, engaging movies for entertainment? More Gladiators and less Milks, please.
This is a great idea. People forget that Lincoln was a "tough guy", a championship-level wrestler in the days when wrestling was real and opponents were not movie stars. John was wrong about Lincoln believing he had to save America to save the world. He was saving the Union because that was his Constitutional obligation and he believed in the rule of law. He was the consummate lawyer. I hope that someone with influence over Eastwood will take this idea to him. We especially need a Lincoln movie about his gifts and challenges as Commander in Chief. Eastwood working from a script written with Trial by Fire (James McPherson) as the basis for the script–a sure winner in every sense of the world. Frank Langella at 6'4" would be the perfect Lincoln.
Robert Rodat who wrote Saving Private Ryan also wrote The Patriot which is unabashedly American, and proud, no matter how hard Roland Emmerich tried to cover that up. It seems to me that the line John quoted was a line that got some work done on it. Now its not to say many veterans didn't think that way. WW2 was a God awful mess. But the lack of mention of the country, of the fact that the guys they were fighting were not merely German troops but Waffen SS is not good story telling. You see a German soldier in camo back then you can see the Deaths Head on his cover.
Spielberg began taking himself too seriously. He began thinking he really didn't have to work that hard. Maybe his own imagination got dulled? After Schindler's List its like he had a personality transplant. We miss Steven. I don't know who this other guy is. So very glad he won't get Lincoln made.
You're thinking West Side Story, when you're a jet, you're a jet all the way. (Sorry, couldn't resist.)
"Band of Brothers" succeeded and is greatness itself because the original Band of Brothers were involved in the writing and filming and wouldn't let anything but truth be filmed. Left to their own devices you know that Hanks and Spielberg would have produced just another version of "Saving Private Ryan".
As a contrarian regarding Abraham Lincoln, I see him as a tall, skinny, melancholy guy who probably had Marfan's syndrome who invaded a sovereign nation (the Confederacy) and caused the death of more Americans than perhaps any other president. Slavery was and is abhorrent, however, Lincoln's freeing them was arbitrary. Slaves were NOT freed in the Border States which were technically neutral or sided with the North. That suggests Lincoln didn't give a rip about the blacks in chains, he just didn't want to be the president who lost half the country. There's an urban legion which I don't know is true or not (I tend to disbelieve it but with historians being nothing but propagandists, who knows) that Lincoln was a Racist who believed blacks and whites did not belong together and planned, before his assassination, to send them back to Africa. (Any non brainwashed historians out there who can honestly speak to this subject?)
And Britain and the Yankees can stop being so high and mighty about slavery. Who the hell do they think we think sold America the slaves? Britain and Spain fought a war (The Treaty of Asciento ended it) over which country had the right to SELL SLAVES to the Americas. So far as the Yankees, they had the boats. The filled the hold with rum which they took to Africa, bought slaves, brought them to the South, bought cotton and returned home having made a profit on every leg of the trip. Some say the Civil War started not over slavery but over the Yankees enacting legislation that put a huge tariff on Southern Cotton thereby forcing the South to sell the cotton to the North at a reduced price. The South bolted. When it looked like Britain (who wanted the cotton) was going to jump in on the South's side, good old Abe hastily freed the slaves IN THE SOUTH because of Britain's anti-slavery policy.
More damning to Spielberg is that slavery is still practiced in other parts of the world, most especially in Muslim nations, and there is nary a word about it from the celebrated retards infesting Hollywood. That said, "Lincoln" is a perfect vehicle for Spielberg.
The problem is that evil (and sin) don't just sit dormant in the human "heart". Without acknowledgment and repentance, evil GROWS. Eventually, it grows so big that moral "relativism" changes into moral inversion. Black becomes white. Wrong becomes right. Sin becomes virtue.
If I had to guess? Spielberg probably thinks goldfish and pirannahs can live in the same fishbowl. It's always easier to think it so, until you have to share the fishbowl with the pirannahs.
Israel can't afford to be goldfish. Bottom line.
I was a teen when ET came out, and I absolutely hated that movie. Hated it. Still do. Close Encounters, ditto, Munich, ditto, Terminal, ditto, Jurassic Park, ditto. The Color Purple, ditto. I enjoyed the Indiana Jones movies, hated the last one, loved Jaws, and really liked Minority Report.
I did enjoy the South Park episode with Speilberg, however.
Oh, forgot, loved/cried through Schindler's list, and wanted to slit my wrist during Saving Private Ryan.
Hollywood had better get their proverbial heads out of there a$$es and begin to entertain again with a semi-original thought, Speilberg being a prime example. I believe that no Hollywood producer/director should touch the subject of Lincoln. If you treat the story honestly it could disrupt some real American mythology, and these idiots would try to draw comparisons to Barry, that would make it a comedy. As a consumer of movies, “Hollywood,” some simple advice, entertain, entertain, entertain.
As far as I'm concerned the most deplorable part of Schindler's List was the scene in which the Jews herded into the showers were initially terrified at being gassed instead (the tried and true M.O. of the Nazi vermin), but instead broke into relieved laughter when the showers then dispensed water instead of Zyklon B.
It was so shocking to see this corruption of historical fact that it ruined the entire film for me.
As for Munich- his attempt to portray both the Israeli counter terrorist assassins and the murdering Palestinian scum in a similar light was morally despicable and revolting, and soured me forever on a man whom I once regarded as a genius and an icon (for "Raiders", "E.T', "Private Ryan", etc.).
No longer.
Perhaps, but I was using his own words, and the tone of his posts to make my decison that he was just here to be a flamer, not a serious poster. As far as Lincoln, and racism, who knows. He did, as someone else put it so well, live in a different time, with a different outlook. I am sure I am not the person to ask, however. Racism is the most boring, overblown topic on planet Earth. People see racism in the bottom of their cereal bowls these days. It is ridiculous. Yawn.
Sad but true article.
That's a very good point. Much like the argument in "Private Ryan" that there was stuff that could have been done with motivations, things people wanted to fight for, etc. that weren't done.
It could be the money. Changes folks sometimes.
Why are you crapping on Breaking 2? That movie rules!
At least he is not planning the expected hagiographic biopic of his bestest pal, Fidel – yet.
I always found ET's stuff fine in a plot sense. One can be distrustful of government while loving one's country (My problem with the Obama followers is they said that about Bush but now refuse to acknowledge it about their own guy Barack the overhyped)
And as a kid I never had a problem with that stuff as part of the movie, it suprised me when he edited the guns out. Of course federal agents carry guns, and of course they'd be worried about an alien. At that point they don't know if E.T. is "E.T." or if he's the Alien from "War of the Worlds." So of course they're worried. I figured that all out when I was 9 years old watching the movie.
I think people in Hollywood don't build creativity, they attack it through a certain atmosphereof making everything "standard" and bland. Spielberg has done a lot of great stuff. Maybe his writers that he picks have been too exposed to Hollywood and he needs to go more into making his scripts his own. His directing has always been excellent.
I am curious if you guys realize that Clint's next film is about Nelson Mandela?
This may not be a real popular response (there goes my +43 "reputation score") but I suspect that this is what you get when you subtract out the religious underpinning from a Judaic conscience.
Guilt without the redemptive moderation of being God's Chosen.
I just got a "moderation" message for using three asterisks in a row to replace a common-usage vulgarism. Are we really wanting to be that sanitary here?
"and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which prevents them from living together on terms of social and political equality…"
Wow; Lincoln saw the NBA coming, fourscore years before its founding. What a visionary.
Holy cow…two hours of watching Naomi Watts push papers behind a desk at Langley?
I guess the drama will center around what she decides to wear for "casual Friday"…
Sheldon
". . . and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth."
Sounds like saving America in order to save the world to me.
Please don't tell us "That was just a speech and id not refelct Lincoln's real thinking."
Saving Private Ryan…just another propaganda machine aimed at buffooning the Germans for a whole new generation of brain dead movie goers. I just loved the scene when the Waffen SS soldier starts sniveling and denouncing Hitler within 2 seconds of being captured – utterly laughable! My grandfather interrogated SS Men at Weisbaden Castle during the war, and his FIRST HAND accounts were much different to say the least. Speilberg soiled himself trying to attach himself to the memory of the Greatest Generation…I bet Janine Garafalo is a BIG fan though.
When was it that conservatives became such huge fans of the Confederacy? During the Lincoln-Douglas debates, yes , Lincoln suggested sending the slaves back to Africa. That's not an urban LEGEND (not legion, you fool).
"It's self indulgence. Some successful artists get to a point where they don't know when they're making wrong choices, and no one is going to tell them when they're wrong."
Thank you for this insight. If you replace the word artists with any of the following, politicians, large corp CEO, bureaucrat (at almost any level) and you revel an underlying cause to many of our current problems.
Spielberg's decline into Lefty Groupthink reached the point of no return when he hooked up with Tony Kushner.
However, he gave me my two favorite modern films – "Close Encounters" and "ET" and for that I will be forever grateful to him.
LIBERALISM and Political Correctness has RUINED America and what it once stood for….I am moving to a place where people are classy, educated and respectful of others. All thats left here in Hollywood, is illegal aliens, and ignorant liberal retards who think voting in a guy born in kenya is going to save the world. liberal media is a brainwashing machine that affect weak minded individuals. I'm out of here.!!!!
Duel was a great little film, I first saw it around the time it was released, and searched for a copy for years. I found one and re-watched it recently. I stilled liked it, but for different reasons. It really is a period piece, and now that I work in the trucking industry, I am a big fan of the old dual stick tractors. and I owned a few of those cars that Dennis Weaver drove in the movie, so the whole thing is a really trip down memory lane for me.
Magic? I suppose if you define that as the triumph of technique. Anyway I always thought "Always" was his best film, if only because it included George Custer's calvary theme "Garry Owen" as a musical leitmotif.
You are so right. I have a glitch that keeps me from thumb's upping you, but you have a thumbs up in my head.
I think that Spielberg's new project should be an heroic biopic of himself . Struggling to get out of the truth about aliens to an unbelieving nation of Terri Garrs. The missed opportunities to change the course of human events when sharks threatened slavers on the high seas. The creative juices muddied by the egos of overacting, undertalented stars who can't exist on twenty million a year. The lost chosen child in the jungles of Ovitza finding the keys to the dreamworks. OPM ! DNC ! Watching his wife explode the heads of evil attorneys, but they're his attorneys !! AARGGHHHH !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
That would be Indy Thalberg and the Temple of Gross Points.
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