The Steven Spielberg Story

[Ed Gordon]

Larry, I did a post about an interview Speilberg did with Terry Gross at NPR. Here is a copy of it, so all discussion will be in one place.

Steven Spielberg was a fearful kid

November 09, 2022, 08:26 PM



Steven Spielberg was a fearful kid who found solace in storytelling


Oscar Award-winning filmmaker Steven Spielberg still remembers the first time he went to the movies. His parents took him to see The Greatest Show on Earth Cecil B. DeMille's 1952 drama set in the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, but there was a misunderstanding.

"I had never been to a motion picture," Spielberg recalls. "And ... I actually thought they were saying to me, 'We're taking you to a circus.' "

Settling into his seat in the theater, Spielberg felt betrayed. Where was the big tent? Where were the circus animals he had been expecting? But then the red curtain opened and the film began and it didn't take him long to fall under become enchanted.

"I didn't understand the story, didn't understand what they were saying, but the imagery was amazing," he says.


Listen to the full podcast here: https://www.npr.org/2022/11/09/11343...berg-fabelmans

[Graham Ritchie]

Well I got a surprise this week, "Reading" was screening it at 7pm tonight, so just had to go. I must say its very well done, and folks if you haven't seen it yet, "do so". I think the running time was over 2hrs 30minutes. Its long and covers a lot of ground from his life as a child, to when he starts at the studio. It was nice to watch him spending a lot of time on a 8mm editor and cement splicer, up to shooting 16mm and showing his early films.

As I say "go and watch it", its really well worth a visit to the cinema

[Osi Osgood]

I wonder if a directors energy in film-making, directly surrounds they're age. You see Speilberg's first ten years and, as a general rule, they are energetic and fast paced. As he has aged, añd he personally slows down in body and mind, his films loose that energy? There seems to be that corresponding element.

[Douglas Meltzer]

I would disagree with that generalization. George Miller made Mad Max: Fury Road, a brilliant non-stop action film, at age 70. Seven years later, he's currently finishing up the prequel Furiosa.

I think The Fabelmans is an impressive, outstanding film. As Graham said, it's well worth seeing on a big screen.

[Mike Newell]

Shame he hasn’t made a decent movie for 20 years. Once he got awards from the luvvies he has played it safe ever since. Much prefer Robert Zemeckis, James Cameron or Martin Scorsese’s output. There’s also John Carpenter and Tobe Hooper but saintly Stephen made sure he sabotaged their careers along with others forever.

[Ed Gordon]

I was looking forward to seeing this, but after watching it yesterday I was disappointed. It has a strong start, and then branches out to cover his family and goes downhill from there. He tried to cover too much and good editor could easily cut 45 minutes off the 2 1/2 hour run time to produce a tighter more cohesive movie. I suspect that I was expecting more about how he developed his talent for making great movies, but movie making is not central to the plot.

Regardless, anyone interested in film should see this. You will most likely identify with the child who discovered the magic of making movies.

One of the better scenes was about Stephen's first interview for a job making movies. He talked about that in this interview:

The Fablemans would have been far better had he devoted more time to stories like this.

[Mike Newell]

Wonder did Spielberg ever make any input to the Universal 8 editing of his movies? Duel, Jaws, Sugarland Express and 1941. It has been bandied about over the years but is there is any truth in it. Knowing him he likely retained ownership rights.

[Steve Klare]

We saw "The Fabelmans" tonight and I thought it was a really great film. The family dynamic in it was downright painful, kind of a slow-motion train wreck, but real life gets that way sometimes. By the same token, there were parts of their story that were really beautiful.

Then again, I loved the cars, the cameras, the projectors and the films! (Points OFF for the sequence where he projects a film we saw shot on 16mm on an 8mm projector!)

There's a sequence where he walked into a camera store and the man behind the counter slapped a couple of rolls of movie film down on the counter. It gave me a pulse of adrenaline! (-personal weakness!)

-so, if you enjoy what we talk about here, this is probably a movie you should see.

I'm glad I saw it, but I'm not sure how good it will be the second time: in the middle of the story there is so much suspense about how the characters are going to figure out their dilemma that can't be there if you watch it knowing how they ultimately did.

[Graham Ritchie]

Worth a watch folks..

[Graham Sinden]

Looking forward to buying this on DVD but one thing I know won't be there is a Spielberg Commentry track because he doesn't do them, which is a shame as I would love to hear his story while watching this.

Graham S

[Graham Ritchie]

Graham

This is a very interesting interview with Steven Spielberg.

[Melvin England]

I finally decided to spend some of my Vue Cinema voucher that I was given as a present at Christmas and popped over there yesterday afternoon to watch The Fabelmans.

Verdict: Overall disappointing.

I know I wasn't sure what I was expecting, but I suppose if I was expecting a biography of Spielberg's life in film, then it failed miserably. Even if I was just expecting the story that was given to me.... his life up until he "arrived," which it certainly WAS, there were places in the film where I felt it just started wandering a bit. It is frustrating because I cannot put my finger on it. Certainly the earlier part with the setting up of the filming of the crashing of the trains and other situations he created were interesting. I think that has already gone into Spielberg folk-lore. The build up of the discovery of his mother's relationship with the lodger was well handled but I saw that coming right from the beginning. The meeting with John Ford was also a great moment.

I am just speculating that as this was a self indulgent production, that Spielberg , as I do when editing / sound tracking my holiday video's, ended up making the movie for himself and forgot there was an audience to entertain.

Sorry, but for me it just lacked that certain "je ne sais quoi". Was the film too long? Was there too much in it ? Was that subject matter of interest ?

[David Hardy]

Even though i have in the past shown and seen the majority of Spielberg's movies at the cinema and enjoyed them at the time and at risk of sounding an oddball i have only around three of his movies in my collection . I found that viewing the rest of them once is more than enough for me.

[Alan Myers]

From what ive read, after 4 weeks in theatres, it grossed 6 million making it the worst financial performance ever for a Speilberg film. Thanks to the awards it will do very well.
i guess this Director has a freehand at Hollywood,
this is a movie i will wait to see on the TV, the trailers good though, the music makes it so.

[Mike Newell]

Freehand until he delivers a trail of bombs at the box office. Mind you he could always bankroll a few movies on his own. Once he got awards he went sentimental and slushy plus every movie is 3 bum numbing hours. Never mind plenty of other directors out there.