Steven Spielberg has always been a fairly personal filmmaker, espically as regards his Jewish heritage (Schindlers List, Munich). In terms of his own life he's touched on being a child of divorce (E.T.) and even a Boy Scout in the desert (Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade). With 'The Fabelmans' Spielberg goes all out autobiographical, adapting his own childhood with the help of Tony Award winning playwright and past collaborator Tony Kushner (Lincoln), who helps keep the basic structure but fictionalize the details, putting the "fabel" in Fabelmans.
There are two principle throughlines to the piece (and a couple additional minor ones). His love of movies and moviemaking of course, but also his relationship with his parents, the mildly indulgent but fair Burt (Paul Dano) whose a skilled enginer, and the freespirted Mitzi (Michelle Williams) who had wanted to be and almost was a professional pianist.
Those familiar with Spielberg's life story, espically if you have seen the excellent documentary "Spielberg" of a few years back, will recognize many of the events here depicted. The very first sequence of the film shows the then 5 year old taken to see his first movie, the Cecil B. DeMille circus epic "The Greatest Show on Earth". I had seen that movie before but seeing clips from it on a big screen, which look excellent, really drive home how impactful that experince must have been for a young boy who had never seen a movie before.
This experience stays with our Steven surrogate Sam, changes his life, becomes an obession, he must recapture the magic of that experience. At first dismissed by his father as an expensive hobby, Sam starts by filming his toy train as a young child, to becoming the family chronicler of vactions, to making increasingly elaborate films in the desert with friends after the family moves to Arizona for dad's work. Family drama and a late in high school move to California prompt Sammy to try and leave filmmaking behind him, become serious. However an opportunity to film the senior class beach trip presents its self, and Sam's back behind the camera and deterimended that filmmaking must be his life.
In counterpoint to this passion is the slow breakdown in his parents marriage, his fathers work obsession feeding into emotional, if not (at least at first) physical infidelity by his mother. Sam loves and respects his father, but the emotional kinship and sense of connection was with the mother. As he pieces together Mitzi's feelings for a close family friend (Seth Rogan), copping proves very difficult.
There is a lot going on in 'The Fabelmans", I haven't even touched on Sam's three sisters and extended family, his friends and enamies at school, the girls he likes, one in particular (Chloe East). There is the stress of the moves, the efforts to find purpose and direction in life, as well as encounters with suburban anti semitism.
Gabriel LaBelle is an excellent and sympathetic surragate for Speilberg, he captures the earnest sincierity, the excitement and awkwardness that is easy to imagine in Steven as a young man. The large cast is solid, in addition to those already mentioned Julia Butters as sister Reggie is a standout. Though I want to take a moment and circle back to Michelle Williams, she really is one of the greatest actresses of her generation, you forget just how good she is and then you see her in someting, an Oscar finally for her please.
A very personal and in some ways small scale story, "The Fabelmans" is still worth seeing on the big screen. It's what his parents would want you to do, to best experince the magic of it. This is a film that Steven Speilberg had to make, and it's probably the best movie of the year.****
No comments:
Post a Comment