The only movie Steven Spielberg can watch again and again: “Pretty perfect”
The reputation of Steven Spielberg as one of the most prolific directors in film history is hard to dispute. Chances are that, even if you are not a movie buff or cinema obsessive, you have watched a fair few of Spielberg’s films. Spanning multiple genres, styles and time periods, Spielberg’s body of work is virtually unavoidable. Like many artists, however, the director very rarely indulges in his own work. Out of the 36 films he has directed over the years, there is only one he felt compelled to revisit.
Spielberg made his first steps into directing in 1971 with Duel. It was not long before the director struck gold with a run of undisputed classics, including seminal films like Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and the Indiana Jones series, among countless others. Over 50 years since his first feature film, Spielberg shows little signs of slowing down, having recently released the coming-of-age film The Fabelmans in 2022.
Millions of people across the globe love Spielberg’s filmography, often imbued with a timeless quality that has endeared his work to multiple generations. Despite the incredible quality of his filmography, Spielberg has little interest in exercising his ego by sitting down to bask in the glory of his own work. Interviewed on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, the acclaimed director affirmed, “I don’t look a lot at my movies after I’ve made them”. However, there does seem to be one notable exception to this rule.
Continuing in the largely retrospective interview, Spielberg revealed, “I don’t look back too often, but every once in a while, I’ll see a movie with my kids.” This is where the difficulty arises because Spielberg himself directed one of the greatest children’s films of all time, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, back in 1982. “I don’t want them to see E.T. without dad sitting there,” he shared, “especially with the scary parts at the beginning.”
Generally, the reason why Spielberg doesn’t like to go back and revisit his previous work is a result of endless perfectionism. Often, he will see something within the films that he wishes he could change. “Sometimes I see things that I had intended to do that I didn’t do,” he said before adding, “but for the most part, E.T. is a pretty perfect movie.”
Spielberg did not go on to reveal whether his children shared the feeling of E.T. being “a pretty perfect movie”, but it is hard to dispute its quality either way. After all, the film garnered four Academy Awards and a Bafta upon its release, which is no mean feat even for a director of Spielberg’s ilk. “It’s one of the few movies I’ve made that I can actually look back at again and again,” the director said.
Admittedly, E.T. is not the only film within Spielberg’s portfolio that he could list as perfect. “There’s about five or six films that I can watch again,” he admitted, “but I don’t usually do that.” The director didn’t reveal which of his films made up those five or six ones to revisit, but, in fairness, he does have a lot to choose from.
Watch the full interview below.
