The Spielberg triplets

There are three fimakers I would liketo discuss today: The Stevens Spielbergs. Although there are some similarities besides their names each one of the Spielbergs has his distinctive trademarks and approach in filmmaking.

Let's start with my favourite one Steven Spielberg the Entertainer:

You all know him; as director or producer he defined the term block buster and while Cameron (one of the Camerons actually but this is another story) climbed to the top spot of boxoffice with "Titanic" ( http://www.boxofficemojo.com/alltime/world/) Stevie1 (for short) made movies like Jaws, Jurassic park, ET, the Indiana trilogy with a combined box office record of no less that 9 billion dollars, and probably more if adjusted for inflation.

Every child knows and loves this Spielberg and his movies although often soulless are the kind of mindless and innocent entertainment that we all expect from Hollywood.

Grade: 10/10

Things are bound to go downhill with the other Spilberbergs. And especially the middle one:

Steven (I can be very serious moralist indeed and I want my Oscar now!) Spielberg.

Stevie 2 (for short) started his carrier a bit later than S1 (for shorter). His movies for a long time were badly acted hypersentimental and moralistic box office flops usually financed by his successful brother. Masterpieces like Empire of the Sun, Color purple and Always have not only left a small hole in his big brothers pocket but most significantly failed to bring the little golded statue in the house. He had already played the race card with Color purple so in his next step he should be very careful.

Ah, let me tell you the basics of the Oscar rules. There are three cards; race card, mentally ill, and general pain and suffering epic. The other rule is that if your name is Martin Scorcese you never get an Oscar no matter how many cards you play but that is completely irrelevant story.

So, to get back on track S2 decided to play the Holocaust card (under the "general pain and suffering epic" card). And to prove he's really really serious and to disconnect himself from his clownish brother, to even film it in black and white. Well what do you know? Everyone bought this tripe! What if the most memorable character is the Villain? What if the Jewish people are treated by Spielberg exactly as by the Nazis: as lists and numbers? What if there is no depth in any of the characters? What if we learn nothing about history, what if we are in the wow! zone for such a long time as to feel nothing? Mission accomplished and S2 got away with the gold.

(You want Holocaust? Get the Pianist by Polanski or the Conspiracy and you will see what is a movie and a document and what is sugar coated cheese)

Did our hero felt satisfied? Of course not and off he goes with Amistad. Unfortunately you cannot play the race card twice so this flop got what it deserved. Nothing. Understanding that there is little room for failure for his next project he enlisted all the goodies of the Hollywood market, namely: Tom Hanks, gore (not Al, the real gore) and a favourable heroic story.

Saving Private Ryan: The movie starts with the usual emotional blackmail, cemetary, old man, tearfull eyes and then it throws enough gore for the next twenty minutes so any survivors were too flabbergusted dumbfound and bedazzled to notice that the rest of the film had some minor flaws, like sketchy characters, minimal plot, constant heroics and wooden acting. And please tell me; did anyone here sympathized with Ryan his brothers and his mother? Or you were like everyone else in the "die fritz, OMG a sniper, pass the ammo" mood?

What do you know? He got it again!

P.S. Band of Brothers on the other hand is an excellent example how S1 can produce the same thing if he's not after the statue. But for S2 that was impossible.

Grade 2/10 (and that is for the gore)

Anyway that second Oscar seems to have drugged him for the time being especially after the Terminal which no one remembers, so probably his career is over. Good riddance. But this is not true for the third triplet the Dark Steven Spielberg:

Unlike his brothers he's serious but not so pedantic, action oriented but sober and decisively philosophical. His first movie and his best until now came in 1971 with the Duel a gruelling and haunting acount of a highay chase. He had a break for some years, probably watching European cinema, and he made a not so glorious comeback with AI a dystopian script that the late Kubrick had in mind to use for toilet paper or something. A weepy SF thriller about robots who have a heart and felings moommy and bad guys who tortured the robots and nice underwater shots...sorry if it didn't sound coherent but it never was actually.

Next project was to destroy a Philip K Dick's novel. This is a favourite past time of many film directors and they are quite succesful in pulling all the punches and oversimplifying the stories to a degree where any person with half a living brain cell can leave the auditorium happy. So after Verhoeven and Total Recall, Scott and Blade Runner and the unthinkable Second Variety, S3 took a pot shot at Minority Report. Or Minority Report MI:3. So happy was he with Tom that he decided to trash another movie the War of the worlds, by reducing the end of the world as we know it to a family affair and some aliens out of ID4...

Grade 3/10

Tonight I'm watching Munich. I have some tips from friends that there may be a fourth Spielberg brother. So, I'll update this post tomorrow...

For more info:http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000229/

You didn't like Total Recall?
To be fair it wasn't as awe inspiring as Commando, but you can very seldom get that level of quality more than once.

to quote IMB:

This is by far one of the greatest movies of the century. I can't believe what an awesome movie it is. It has no morals, no lessons to teach, no political statements, no coherence, and no sense whatsoever. When Schwarzeneggar's beloved daughter is kidnapped by a psychotic dictator, he doesn't try to reason with the bad guys or take precautions like most action heroes would. He just goes bonkers and starts killing everyone in sight. The movie is packed with fantastic scenes such as Arnie crashing a car at about 80 mph, without a seatbelt, and being perfectly fine, Arnie tearing a phone booth out of a wall, Arnie punching a guy through a wall, etc. It's gloriously entertaining.

Also, despite his reputation for bad acting, he delivers all his lines with perfect comic timing ("Let off some steam, Bennett"). Bennett is also a great character, but no match for Arnold. You'd have to be completely devoid of personality to not find this at least slightly entertaining.

Originally Posted by Tostig

You didn't like Total Recall?
To be fair it wasn't as awe inspiring as Commando, but you can very seldom get that level of quality more than once.

Commando was king.

I was actually impressed by munich. Not as lopsided as I expected, still it isn't flawless, some over the top drama and pathos here and there.