Summer of Spielberg: The Elder Statesman

Part 8 of 8

If there is one thing Steven Spielberg is brilliant at predicting, it’s what people will pay money to see at the movies. Ever since the ’80s, Spielberg has had one of the most marketable names one could put on a movie trailer. With a handful of exceptions, having Spielberg as a producer or executive producer for your project will do a lot when it comes to marketing and how the public perceives your film. There’s a reason the trailers for all the Transformers films feature Spielberg’s name as prominently as Michael Bay’s: his presence will bring a certain number of people in. Particularly in recent years, Spielberg has been awfully generous with his “executive producer” credits, but he has a long history of supporting films he believes 1) will be good, or 2) will make money. What’s encouraging about this is that Spielberg has decided not to become a hermit who releases only his movies and ignores everything else. He actively helps movies to get made because he likes a world where they exist.

One of the earliest high-profile examples of Spielberg-as-producer is 1982’s Poltergeist, though many question whether Spielberg wasn’t the actual director of the film. This was a film he co-wrote with Michael Grais and Mark Victor, and he really wanted to be the director, but because of his deal with Universal Studios he was unable to take credit. Instead, the director’s chair went to Tobe Hooper of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre fame. Ultimately, the truth seems to be that Hooper and Spielberg more or less co-directed the film, with Spielberg the more vocal of the two. (Spielberg was allegedly a large part of the editing process as well.) The final film certainly seems to be a Spielbergian creation, and it’s also clear that this was a film Spielberg was really, really invested in. Regardless, it’s one of the first examples of Spielberg using his name in a non-directorial fashion in order to get a film made.

The ’80s saw Spielberg elevate several mainstream films to success, and most of them remain high-profile to this day. After Poltergeist, Spielberg saw a string of success with films such as Gremlins, Back to the Future, The Goonies, An American Tail, The Land Before Time and Who Framed Roger Rabbit. At this point that he was likely truly invested in every project to which he attached his name; in many cases his involvement was the reason it got made. This was a decade where most everything Spielberg touched became monstrously successful, and he directed E.T., which became the biggest money maker of all time until James Cameron’s Titanic. Considering he wasn’t particularly old yet, this influence was something rare indeed.

In many ways, Spielberg is a man who directs a widely influential film and then makes sure to be involved with that film’s offspring. While many of his producing credits wouldn’t exist without his help, they also wouldn’t exist if he hadn’t been the one who made their predecessors. In the wake of Jurassic Park—one of the first films to prominently feature CGI creatures—he produced several effects-driven blockbusters such as Casper, the ridiculous yet sometimes ridiculously awesome Twister, and the just ridiculously awesome Men in Black. Never one to tread familiar ground, Spielberg tends to give the derivative stuff to others.

This is particularly true as we entered the ’00s, when Spielberg continued to take on material that—with the exception of Indiana Jones and the Film That Shall Not Be Named—refused to give in to purely commercial urges. It wouldn’t have been surprising to me if A.I., Minority Report, War of the Worlds or Munich tanked, simply because they are off-putting where his earlier blockbusters like Raiders of the Lost Ark and E.T. were easy to swallow. A jaunt through his producing/executive producing credits in this decade is a journey through mostly safe blockbuster and/or prestige fare. The most obvious (and financially successful) of these is the Transformers films, which is a series I think Spielberg is more involved in than many think. No, I don’t believe he’s on set every day, but I do think this is a franchise which he watches over closely in the pre-production stages. Once he lets Michael Bay loose, all bets are likely off.

Steven Spielberg, pausing for a brief photo with Satan.

As frequently as we saw Spielberg’s name on movie trailers in the past decade, nothing quite matches his output in 2011 alone. This is a year where he has his name attached to 7 movies, six of which he’s producing or executive producing and two of which he’s directing. (He has a voice cameo in Greg Mottola’s Paul, which is the seventh.) Of these, the closest to his heart is likely J.J. Abrams’ Super 8, of which he was just a regular old producer. (However, I do find it odd that he produced a film which is essentially a tribute to himself. But never mind.) Besides the mostly commercial efforts Transformers: Dark of the Moon, Real Steel and the surprise failure Cowboys & Aliens, things don’t get real interesting for Mr. Spielberg until the end of the year. It is at this point that two of his directorial efforts will be released within the same week: War Horse and The Adventures of Tintin: Secret of the Unicorn.

While both of these films show Spielberg returning to the family-friendly blockbuster, Tintin continues his recent pattern of challenging himself rather than taking the easy way out. Ever since Robert Zemeckis started desperately trying to make it a thing, motion capture has yet to really catch on with filmgoers. The supposed “realism” has never looked all that realistic, and for the most part they’ve occupied an unsettling middle ground between animation and live action. With the Tintin project, Spielberg—along with Peter Jackson—will attempt to bring the technology further using Weta Digital, the company which has proven itself to be one of the best digital effects giants out there. (Most recently, they created the brilliant Caesar in Rise of the Planet of the Apes.) If Spielberg, Jackson and Weta are not able to make it work with Tintin, then I’m not sure motion capture will ever be widely-accepted.

Just five days after the release of Tintin comes War Horse, his film adaptation of a widely-beloved children’s novel and a stage play. What’s remarkable about this $90 million production is that it stars absolutely no one; the biggest “stars” are likely Tom Hiddleston (Loki from Thor) and David Thewlis (Remus Lupin from the Harry Potter films). This is a film that will be marketed solely using Spielberg’s name, and the desire of audiences everywhere to see the heartwarming tale of a boy and his horse. After all, “a boy and his ______” stories are something Spielberg is very good at. Rumors are he was the one who pushed Transformers to be about “a boy and his car.”

Spielberg is also planning on having his biopic of Abraham Lincoln out at the end of next year. In a choice almost as obvious as casting Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela or Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher, Abraham Lincoln will be played by the world’s foremost thespian Daniel Day-Lewis, who shan’t break character throughout the entirety of shooting. So if you’re walking down the streets of Richmond, Virginia this fall (where Lincoln is being filmed) and you pass a man in a tall hat and a beard who asks you how best to get to Ford’s Theatre—he’d really like to take in a show, you see—that is probably Daniel Day-Lewis. He wanders off from time to time. After Lincoln, Spielberg is allegedly directing a film called Robopocalypse, which I’m guessing is about a robot apocalypse. Just a hunch.

Well, I believe this inelegantly brings me to the end of the Summer of Spielberg, as I have run out of things to say. As always, I would like to thank you all for reading and putting up with the constant lateness of these posts. (This summer has been busier than I had anticipated.) Perhaps I will do this for another director next summer if I feel so inclined. If you have suggestions, feel free to let me know. If nothing else, this journey through the entire Spielberg filmography has reminded me just how good he actually is; something that can be forgotten given his occasional overexposure. With the exception of 1941, he has never made a film which is a complete waste of time, for even his failures are fascinating in their own way. Though he’s inspired a lot of hacks, anyone who has given us so much greatness cannot be blamed. Spielberg is the man who helped craft the modern movie landscape, for better or for worse. But mostly better.

I wanted an excuse to put this in here, but I couldn't find it. So here it is.