It is Steven Spielberg’s most personal film and is now available for free on Prime Video

With more than half a century creating authentic celluloid masterpieces, no one can deny that Steven Spielberg He is one of the great filmmakers of the seventh art. From Sharkpassing through jurassic parkuntil Schindler’s List and Saving Private RyanHollywood’s King Midas has proven to know how to perform perfectly in practically all genres. Even in the musical field, where his style and imprint improved the classic version of West Side Story. However, it wasn’t until recently that the two-time Oscar winner directed his most nostalgic film. We talk of course The Fabelmansa proposal with a lot of his personal past and much, worse than much cinema.

It does not seem like the most favorable time for the imagination of the American director to shine with splendor. Hollywood is experiencing a season where theatrical exhibition seeks stretch the franchises to the limittrying to invest multimillion-dollar budgets with some security at the box office. And of course, in this context it is not surprising that both his review of the musical by Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins, and this recent autobiographical film have been separate business failures for Universal Pictures and its label, Amblin Entertainment. What does seem surprising is that the Academy has overlooked a work that is practically an open love letter to cinema, where Spielberg expresses with images his love for the profession with the humility of a new director. But what story is hidden behind The Fabelmans? How much truth is there in it about the filmmaker’s past?

‘The Fabelmans’: synopsis and cast

The synopsis of The Fabelmans is the following: «Semi-atobiographical film of Spielberg’s own childhood and youth, set in the late 50s and early 60s. In this context, a boy from Arizona named Sammy Fabelman, influenced by his eccentric artist mother and His pragmatic father, a computer engineer, discovers a devastating family secret and explores how the power of movies can help him tell stories and forge his own identity.

Of course, in addition to having the appeal of being an audiovisual narrative by Spielberg, the cast of The Fabelmans It is another of the claims of its cinematographic appeal. The story has Michelle Williams and Paul Dano in the respective roles of the protagonist’s parents, a young version of the director he plays Gabriel LaBelle. The main cast is completed with Seth Rogen, Judd Hirsch, Mateo Zoryon Francis-DeFord, Julia Butters, Jeannie Berlin and Oakes Fegley. It is also very special David Lynch’s brief cameowho plays film director John Ford.

Nominated in 7 categories of the 2023 Oscarsthis piece of the director’s own interior went empty in an edition in which he would end up sweeping Everything at once everywhere and where the chances of winning the consideration for Best Film or Direction seemed more than negligible. The Fabelmans It lasts about two and a half hours and is available today on Prime Video.

What is true behind the story?

Despite being sold as Spielberg’s only autobiographical film, the director wanted to make it very clear that this was a sweetened and more “interesting” version of what he had achieved in his youth. But even in some data, reality is stranger than fiction. For example, the director’s mother did adopted a monkey for his children, but what is not true is that he was the only jewish child of his class. In the rest of film history, there is no confirmation or denial of most of the information provided, so we must stick to the mystery of the always imaginative “movie magic” and not worry about whether it is closer to reality or not.

Spielberg is already preparing his new film

Regardless of his last two commercial failures, Spielberg’s name still has a gigantic weight in the industry. So much so that the director is already preparing his new film, a film in which he will return to his origins through a story with ufos. It still does not have an official name, but for its execution it has once again included screenwriter DDavid Koepp. Writer with whom he has already worked on the first two installments of jurassic parkthe remake of war of the worlds and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. In his new adventure in science fiction, the filmmaker will have stars such as Emily Blunt, Colin Firth and Josh O’Connor under his command. Koepp will likewise be in charge of writing the script for Jurassic World: Rebirththe return to the Jurassic world starring Scarlett Johansson that Spielberg will return to produce.