As both a director and a producer, he is an extraordinary modern-Hollywood success story. Spielberg is a baby boomer whose films reflect both the tender warmth and clear-eyed innocence of childhood. In fact, a large percentage of Spielberg's films - both those he has directed and those he has produced - have children as their protagonists or as significant supporting players. As a director, Spielberg has demonstrated a vivid visual style, but more importantly, he has been a consummate strategist, marshaling script, music, acting, special effects, editing, set design, and so on into an astonishing streak of intelligent, entertaining, and enormously successful motion pictures.
His first movie was the acclaimed The Sugarland Express (1974). This downbeat story starring GOLDIE HAWN failed miserably at the box office, but by the time that had happened, he had already begun to film the suspense film Jaws (1975), the movie that was to catapult him into the directorial stratosphere, a height from which he has yet to descend.
His sequel, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984), wasn't quite as good nor as successful as the original but was still a major hit. The third (and supposedly final) installment in the series was the critical and box-office smash Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989). Between the making of his three Indiana Jones films, Spielberg made E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982). The movie was the perfect blend of innocence and adventure, without evil villains, sex, violence, or even knock-out special effects, but it had more than its share of heart and humor, making it the most commercially successful movie in Hollywood history.
Schindler's List was released on December 15, 1993, perfectly positioned for Academy Award attention, which was, predictably, showered upon it. Even critics cynical about the popular blockbuster success of Jurassic Park were unable to deny the power of this moving Holocaust film, shot in black and white on location in Poland and Germany. Spielberg channeled his profits into the Shoah Foundation, dedicated to preserving oral history accounts and elevating Holocaust awareness.
Thus empowered by these successes, Spielberg flexed his muscles professionally in 1994 by forming a new film-and-television studio, Dreamworks SKG, with Jeffrey Katzenberg and David Geffen; he then directed one of his studio's first major films, Amistad (1997), dramatizing a historic rebellion on a slave ship. His next film was a Dreamworks/Paramount coproduction, Saving Private Ryan (1998), a World War II story starring TOM HANKS, which set the bar higher for movie realism in its representation of the D-day landings on Omaha Beach. Private Ryan won Spielberg his second Oscar for directing.
Private Ryan was followed by another odd diversion when STANLEY KUBRICK called on Spielberg to direct a project that he believed required the Spielberg "touch," a Pinocchio fable set in a dystopian future entitled A.I.: Artificial Intelligence (2001). Spielberg wrote the screenplay from an eight-page sketch written by Brian Aldiss from his own source story and directed the film as well, earning a Golden Globe in 2002 for his efforts. A.I. was regarded as a serious and visually masterful cautionary tale.
This odd Spielberg–Kubrick collaboration was undertaken largely as a tribute to Stanley Kubrick, who died at the age of 70 in 1999, but some critics did not believe that the styles and sensibilities of the two directors meshed ideally. Even if A.I. fell short of recovering its costs (though it grossed more than $78 million), it in no way damaged Spielberg's reputation as a hit-maker. He is the 21st-century equivalent to the 20th century entrepreneurship of WALT DISNEY and he is probably the most recognizable director of his generation.
Spielberg released two films in 2003. The science-fiction crime thriller Minority Report starred TOM CRUISE and a remarkable array of stunning special effects. Unfortunately, its muddied, illogical story and hackneyed conclusion kept it from being the genre classic it could have been. Catch Me If You Can, featuring LEONARDO DICAPRIO, a decidedly lighter movie, was far more successful, giving Spielberg a chance to do what he does best: delve into Americana.
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1. Abbot and Costello were very popular during the sound era
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