Telling of contemporary reviewers’ inability to convert imagery and concept into words is the comparatively prevalent notion of Steven Spielberg as “the family man” of modern Hollywood. It’s one thing to be a gifted entertainer and a completely different one to be a conservative storyteller of children stories to childish adults. People tend to overlook the difference. It’s easier that way.
Undoubtedly however, family is an obsessively present motif in Mr. Spielberg’s work for the last 35 years.
But, family isn’t always viewed favourably and is seldom working properly; most parents in the director’s work are divorced, absent or outright irresponsible. The relationship between fathers and sons is filled with tension, conflict, guilt and self-pity.
But, family isn’t always viewed favourably and is seldom working properly; most parents in the director’s work are divorced, absent or outright irresponsible. The relationship between fathers and sons is filled with tension, conflict, guilt and self-pity.
In Jaws family has to be put aside so that the character deals with the life-threatening adversity and, of course, prove himself a capable protector of society’s safety. Man, family man and public servant cannot operate unless family is put on hold.
In Close Encounters of the Third Kind, family turns out to be irritatingly hostile to Man’s dream. The protagonist’s wife moves from indifference to suspicion, then becomes a true villain when she takes the kids away and threatens with a divorce. Amazingly, the family is altogether abandoned to its earthly delights, when Dreyfuss’s character follows his dream. Family number two in the film is minus a father and appears to be working better…
In Close Encounters of the Third Kind, family turns out to be irritatingly hostile to Man’s dream. The protagonist’s wife moves from indifference to suspicion, then becomes a true villain when she takes the kids away and threatens with a divorce. Amazingly, the family is altogether abandoned to its earthly delights, when Dreyfuss’s character follows his dream. Family number two in the film is minus a father and appears to be working better…
No proof needed, I suppose, about the familial theme in the Indiana Jones quadrilogy. In the definitive cinematic fantasy of boyishness, women can only be the object of flirtation and sexual conquest. Family will never be farthest removed for a film character. The entrance of Jones Sr. in the Last Crusade is a perfect, although “innocently” comic, example of the strain under which both sides struggle to exist. In the marvellous Crystal Skull, family is not more than a comic relief, still Indiana and Jr. are a mirroring of the relationship in the Last Crusade.
In E.T. it is almost as self-evident as in Indiana Jones. This is clearly not the world for grown-ups – they cannot even see the extra terrestrial creature. Almost all of E.T. is shot from a boy’s height (a usual trait of Mr. Spielberg’s direction), the family is crippled, the father conspicuously absent…do you need more?
Fatherhood, after 1985, did indeed influence Mr. Spielberg’s motif about family. Made him an adult who loved children, instead of an adult who refused to give up his childhood dreams. Yet never made him a mindless defender of parenthood and family. More critical, yes, condescending never, sometimes a bit more elegiac with regard to the importance of a solid family structure. [Contrary to popular belief – admittedly due to most of us being children of broken homes – a good family is not a bad thing. Whether or not this is attainable is an issue Spielberg rarely bothers with. In his early films family is insensitive to children needs or altogether, absent.]
In Hook, his final direct effort of dealing with adolescence lost, the entire idea is based on getting away from it all, inescapable as it may be. A fairy tale, unfortunately, never to be experienced again.
Then came the director’s first days of directorial maturity with films like Schindler’s List and Saving Private Ryan that may be accused of many, not for their case on family idealism, I’m afraid.
Jurassic Park and The Lost World were two magnificent rewritings of his earlier stuff, full-blooded adventures becoming more and more embellished with subtextual interest. Families are present, parents divorced and all of them have to prove themselves worthy of parenthood.
In A.I. the family appears to be, similarly to the Close Encounters, a self-centered, emotional crucible, filled with egomania, heartlessness and disregard to anything it doesn’t recognize as its own. David seeks the perfection of what family ought to be; instead he’s left with an incarnated memory, perhaps of his own robotic soul, for what family actually is.
Fatherhood, after 1985, did indeed influence Mr. Spielberg’s motif about family. Made him an adult who loved children, instead of an adult who refused to give up his childhood dreams. Yet never made him a mindless defender of parenthood and family. More critical, yes, condescending never, sometimes a bit more elegiac with regard to the importance of a solid family structure. [Contrary to popular belief – admittedly due to most of us being children of broken homes – a good family is not a bad thing. Whether or not this is attainable is an issue Spielberg rarely bothers with. In his early films family is insensitive to children needs or altogether, absent.]
In Hook, his final direct effort of dealing with adolescence lost, the entire idea is based on getting away from it all, inescapable as it may be. A fairy tale, unfortunately, never to be experienced again.
Then came the director’s first days of directorial maturity with films like Schindler’s List and Saving Private Ryan that may be accused of many, not for their case on family idealism, I’m afraid.
Jurassic Park and The Lost World were two magnificent rewritings of his earlier stuff, full-blooded adventures becoming more and more embellished with subtextual interest. Families are present, parents divorced and all of them have to prove themselves worthy of parenthood.
In A.I. the family appears to be, similarly to the Close Encounters, a self-centered, emotional crucible, filled with egomania, heartlessness and disregard to anything it doesn’t recognize as its own. David seeks the perfection of what family ought to be; instead he’s left with an incarnated memory, perhaps of his own robotic soul, for what family actually is.
In Minority Report, the main character is a failed father, abandoned by his unworthy wife. Nuclear family is disintegrated, the characters have to work hard to prove their competence. Then they’re given a second chance – a second chance never unquestioned but at least earned.
In Catch Me If You Can family is again disintegrated by two irresponsible parents, that in turn endow their offspring with a bleeding, and only marginally treated in the end, trauma of coming of age.
In Munich, traditional family tears the protagonist in half when colliding with the less traditional for us, but more important one if you ‘re a Jew I guess, “familial” structure represented by homeland. Here, family is seen more as a paradise lost – ringing comparison to Terence Malick’s Thin Red Line – and less as a viable reality. Still, in Munich Mr. Spielberg gives us a glimpse into his own soul. At 59, the director allowed himself to present his audience with his own warm sense of homecoming. Disappointingly, this is never enough…
In Catch Me If You Can family is again disintegrated by two irresponsible parents, that in turn endow their offspring with a bleeding, and only marginally treated in the end, trauma of coming of age.
In Munich, traditional family tears the protagonist in half when colliding with the less traditional for us, but more important one if you ‘re a Jew I guess, “familial” structure represented by homeland. Here, family is seen more as a paradise lost – ringing comparison to Terence Malick’s Thin Red Line – and less as a viable reality. Still, in Munich Mr. Spielberg gives us a glimpse into his own soul. At 59, the director allowed himself to present his audience with his own warm sense of homecoming. Disappointingly, this is never enough…
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