Steven Spielberg

May 20, 1996

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Spielberg is without a doubt the most important figure in cinema to appear since the 1970's. Born in Cincinnati on December 18, 1947, Spielberg became a lover of films from the time he was little. He made his earliest film, Firelight, when he was 16. In 1969, he made the short film Amblin (which became the name of his studio). That film lead to a job directing TV shows at Universal studios. Among his variety of shows was Marcus Welby, Columbo and the popular sci-fi series Night Gallery. His first feature-length film was the 1971 TV-movie, Duel, a suspenseful film about a salesman pursued by a monster diesel truck in the desert. The movie was shown in theaters in Europe and received critical praise and commercial success.

His first theatrical film, The Sugarland Express (1974), was a critical hit but failed at the box office. It was not until the enormously popular horror film Jaws (1975), that Spielberg first gained international attention. The story about a great white shark became the highest grossing films of all time, until Star Wars came along two years later. He followed this success with many more popular films. Many of them, whether fantasy or drama, deal with basic human emotional stories, but one in particular, Schindler's List, represented the triumph of the human spirit. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) and the ever-popular (and highest grossing film of all time), E.T., The Extra Terrestrial (1982) all have that basic principle injected into the stories.

Spielberg has had his share of flops. 1941 (1979), a supercomedy, J.G. Ballard's war memory, Empire of the Sun (1987) and Always (1989) have the same principle, but were lacking in character development and good story plotting.

In 1985, Spielberg proved that he was more than just a science fiction-fantasy director, with the adaptation of Alice Walker's popular feminist novel The Color Purple. His recent films in the 1990's have included the Peter Pan story, Hook (1991), the super-popular dinosaur epic Jurassic Park (1993) and his greatest achievment by far, the holocaust epic Schindler's List (1993). Like The Color Purple, it was unanimously praised by both critics and the public. It was also praised internationally as well, and ended up winning seven Academy awards. Spielberg has produced many other popular movies and television shows, including The Flintstones (1994), the Back to the Future series, as well as Tiny Toon Adventures and Amazing Stories. It's fair to say that he's one of the greatest directors that ever lived, but even that might be an understatement.

My rating on a scale of 1 to 10: 10

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