Steven Spielberg named the movies that encapsulate him best
No director has defined more childhoods than Steven Spielberg. The creator of the blockbuster in its current form and the man behind the magical E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, the beloved Indiana Jones series and the shark-infested Jaws, Spielberg has consistently gifted cinema with some of the most well-loved and enduring family films of all time.
As his audiences grew up, it seemed that Spielberg did too. Moving from films tailored toward family cinema trips into Academy Award-winning pictures like Schindler’s List, The Post, and War Horse. Proving his aptitude at the box office and in award season, he now holds a solid reputation as one of the most important and influential filmmakers of all time.
Spielberg may have engineered the blockbuster and earned millions over the course of his 54-year career, but his filmmaking has always seemed driven by heart and honesty rather than money. Amidst huge productions and even more enormous box office takings, Spielberg’s personal touch shines through in his direction.
There’s a familiar warmth to every film he delivers, even if it involves dinosaurs or otherworldly creatures, but there are two that the director believes encapsulates him best. During a conversation with The New York Times in 1982, the filmmaker suggested that Poltergeist and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial capture his two sides.
“Poltergeist is what I fear and E.T. is what I love,” he stated, “One is about suburban evil and the other is about suburban good.” The two films both feature the supernatural and the suburban but in entirely different ways.
A Spielberg classic, the self-described “pretty perfect” E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial was released in 1982 to massive acclaim, quickly taking the title for the highest-grossing film ever. It remains just as beloved and iconic today – references in pop culture remain rife, such as in Netflix’s Stranger Things. Poltergeist, on the other hand, was directed by Tobe Hooper while Spielberg resigned himself to the writer and producer roles, tied up with E.T.
“I had different motivations in both instances,” Spielberg explained, “In Poltergeist, I wanted to terrify and I also wanted to amuse – I tried to mix the laughs and screams together. Poltergeist is the darker side of my nature – it’s me when I was scaring my younger sisters half to death when we were growing up”
E.T., on the other hand, Spielberg describes as representing his “optimism about the future and my optimism about what it was like to grow up in Arizona and New Jersey.” Between the two, audiences are given a full picture of Spielberg’s cinematic interests.
