Spielberg had magic absolutely. The way he wrote characters, the way he filmed and blocked scenes. There's a video talking about blocking, and shows how Spielberg with clever blocking, takes one scene in Jaws, aka without a cut, and gets like 12 shots, by having the scene be on a ferry which constantly changes the background, and has the characters move about on the ferry coming closer or further away from the camera giving distinct blocks.
Most good filmmakers have 1/5 of the great filmography that he does. Ridley Scott is praised and while I think he's a good cinematographer, I think as a general film maker he makes me want to fall asleep.
Is there propaganda to be found in Spielberg's films? Yes, but I don't think it's that extensive and don't know why he's singled out. His films primarily seem to be about entertainment.
Two things can be true. Someone have crap politics in real life, AND be talented in their craft; and those crap politics can seep in.
This can be observed in like 90% of the music industry.
I don't know why someone wants to rob Spielberg of his accolades as a film maker. You can hate the guy and still give him props.
I can't stand the politics of Harrison Ford or Deniro, but they're great at what they did in the 90s and earlier.
I think a lot of the "Spielberg is a propogandist" comes from ET because they see it as him trying to make you sympathetic for illegal aliens.
I watched the film for the first time a few years ago (or at least the first time that I have any memory of, I'm certain I saw it as a kid) and to me that's a reach. You have to want to see that film that way in order to see it as an illegal alien allegory. The government reacts realistically to an alien from outer space and the kid reacts and sees things realistically to encountering a friendly alien. It plays things out realistically if E.T were real and were discovered by kids. The guy who made District 9 and Elysium, now that was actual illegal alien propaganda, and it's not subtext; it's just TEXT.
There are parallel movies where they're trying to push an agenda. Like Planet of the Apes 1968, which surprisingly is not the agenda people think it is. They will tell you it's a "racism parallel" when if you watch the movie, it has almost nothing to do with a racism/slavery thing. It's actually an anti-Christian movie as the plot of the movie is all about how "a talking, reasoning human challenges the religious apes who oppose evolution and the underdog scientists and are trying to control the masses and this human threatens their power by making the populace believe the scientists. Spoiler alert it turns out the religious apes who promoted apes as uniquely made knew all along that evolution was true but were trying to hold onto power. This is a explicit attack on Christianity and a promotion of the Science™
Rod Serling is a true propagandist, though still a brilliant writer (he wrote Planet of the Apes).
So when I watch Spielberg movies I see some propaganda. His most blatant propaganda is in Jurassic Park. Even removing the evolutionary and millions of years lies, it's got feminism pushed in various ways in that movie, sometimes pretty overtly.
Schindler's List? That's just a typical type of movie made about the Holocaust. Any filmmaker going for a dramatic film on that topic would have struck a similar tone.
I think the worst he did was in Saving Private Ryan making all the nazis look like modern day skinhead neo nazis in order to make the audience make a connection despite the fact actual nazi soldiers were not bald and actually mocked the russians for being bald. To me that's compromising your film for modern day optics and that one is irritating because how can you meticulously make one of the most realistic war films with an opening scene that still hasn't been topped and then do historical revisionism like that.
I mean, one of the best things that can be said about Steven Spielberg is he made films that made you feel good, barring the exceptions. In the 70s and 80s he made you feel good. Meanwhile Stanley Kubrick who was more or less not much of a propagandist to my eyes made utterly demoralizing films, as did a lot of filmmakers in that era. Not that a depressing film is bad. I'm not taking the position that all art should be happy. But when that's all that's available such as in the 70s, it has a decaying effect on people, much like we see demoralization today from films constant finger waggling and woke moralizing. Films today make you feel fundamentally bad. Films in the 70s made you feel fundamentally pessimistic. Both were done for different reasons (political ideologues vs auteurs who want to push for art and the boundaries of art are usually depressing) but they both have a similar effect psychologically on the mass of people.
The fact that Spielberg made movies that made you feel happy when you left puts him in the good class of filmmakers in my opinion on that merit alone. I would say Spielberg was an entertainer who sometimes had politics seep in; whereas Rod Serling was a message pusher who was so brilliant he was still entertaining. It's very different. And the guy who made District 9 and Elysium is squarely in the Rod Serling camp except he's a subpar writer and filmmaker so he doesn't get away with it, whereas Rod Serling did.
Rod Serling also had the benefit (benefit for us) of making his biggest show in a time when the studios reigned him in. Lots of Twilight Zone episodes would have been way more preachy if Serling got his way.
I actually wrote an article about this topic using one single movie.
A lot of movies are propaganda and I'd agree that Schindler's List is not meant to entertain you. But if you read my article, I point out how some films were not only entertaining, they were uplifting in their message. In this case, Soldier from 1998.
I'm very glad to encounter someone else who appreciates Soldier. I'm currently working on an illustrated novel that borrows heavily from the premise of Soldier. When I mention to people that it's one of my inspirations, nine times out of ten the response is 'Never heard of it'. It's definitely a hidden gem.
Hey i remember that article. Thanks. Got any more good movie recommendations? I suppose it's hard to kick a habit of watching them after consuming them for decades.
I don't have any off the top of my head. Just surface level likes of films. Nothing immediately jumps to mind as far as a deep recommendation. I like all sorts of films, but I don't have anything primed in "analysis" deep terms, just like more like, 12 monkeys is really good and I thought it sucked the first time I watched it, but I really appreciated it this last time I watched it, sort of thing. Surface level.
I think Kubrick made depressing films in a reflection of the state of mind that he was in. He was surrounded by ethnic pedofiles and died for trying to make a movie about them. We can only imagine what sort of stress he had. I didn't like his movies though apart from Shining so i only have a part of the picture.
Yes, but a long time ago. Black and white, girls dress is red, one of the guys shoots people with a sniper rifle for fun, and I remember the ending where Schindler wishes he had given more away. That's all I remember.
Spielberg had magic absolutely. The way he wrote characters, the way he filmed and blocked scenes. There's a video talking about blocking, and shows how Spielberg with clever blocking, takes one scene in Jaws, aka without a cut, and gets like 12 shots, by having the scene be on a ferry which constantly changes the background, and has the characters move about on the ferry coming closer or further away from the camera giving distinct blocks.
Most good filmmakers have 1/5 of the great filmography that he does. Ridley Scott is praised and while I think he's a good cinematographer, I think as a general film maker he makes me want to fall asleep.
Is there propaganda to be found in Spielberg's films? Yes, but I don't think it's that extensive and don't know why he's singled out. His films primarily seem to be about entertainment.
Two things can be true. Someone have crap politics in real life, AND be talented in their craft; and those crap politics can seep in.
This can be observed in like 90% of the music industry.
I don't know why someone wants to rob Spielberg of his accolades as a film maker. You can hate the guy and still give him props.
I can't stand the politics of Harrison Ford or Deniro, but they're great at what they did in the 90s and earlier.
I think a lot of the "Spielberg is a propogandist" comes from ET because they see it as him trying to make you sympathetic for illegal aliens.
I watched the film for the first time a few years ago (or at least the first time that I have any memory of, I'm certain I saw it as a kid) and to me that's a reach. You have to want to see that film that way in order to see it as an illegal alien allegory. The government reacts realistically to an alien from outer space and the kid reacts and sees things realistically to encountering a friendly alien. It plays things out realistically if E.T were real and were discovered by kids. The guy who made District 9 and Elysium, now that was actual illegal alien propaganda, and it's not subtext; it's just TEXT.
There are parallel movies where they're trying to push an agenda. Like Planet of the Apes 1968, which surprisingly is not the agenda people think it is. They will tell you it's a "racism parallel" when if you watch the movie, it has almost nothing to do with a racism/slavery thing. It's actually an anti-Christian movie as the plot of the movie is all about how "a talking, reasoning human challenges the religious apes who oppose evolution and the underdog scientists and are trying to control the masses and this human threatens their power by making the populace believe the scientists. Spoiler alert it turns out the religious apes who promoted apes as uniquely made knew all along that evolution was true but were trying to hold onto power. This is a explicit attack on Christianity and a promotion of the Science™
Rod Serling is a true propagandist, though still a brilliant writer (he wrote Planet of the Apes).
So when I watch Spielberg movies I see some propaganda. His most blatant propaganda is in Jurassic Park. Even removing the evolutionary and millions of years lies, it's got feminism pushed in various ways in that movie, sometimes pretty overtly.
Schindler's List? That's just a typical type of movie made about the Holocaust. Any filmmaker going for a dramatic film on that topic would have struck a similar tone.
I think the worst he did was in Saving Private Ryan making all the nazis look like modern day skinhead neo nazis in order to make the audience make a connection despite the fact actual nazi soldiers were not bald and actually mocked the russians for being bald. To me that's compromising your film for modern day optics and that one is irritating because how can you meticulously make one of the most realistic war films with an opening scene that still hasn't been topped and then do historical revisionism like that.
I mean, one of the best things that can be said about Steven Spielberg is he made films that made you feel good, barring the exceptions. In the 70s and 80s he made you feel good. Meanwhile Stanley Kubrick who was more or less not much of a propagandist to my eyes made utterly demoralizing films, as did a lot of filmmakers in that era. Not that a depressing film is bad. I'm not taking the position that all art should be happy. But when that's all that's available such as in the 70s, it has a decaying effect on people, much like we see demoralization today from films constant finger waggling and woke moralizing. Films today make you feel fundamentally bad. Films in the 70s made you feel fundamentally pessimistic. Both were done for different reasons (political ideologues vs auteurs who want to push for art and the boundaries of art are usually depressing) but they both have a similar effect psychologically on the mass of people.
The fact that Spielberg made movies that made you feel happy when you left puts him in the good class of filmmakers in my opinion on that merit alone. I would say Spielberg was an entertainer who sometimes had politics seep in; whereas Rod Serling was a message pusher who was so brilliant he was still entertaining. It's very different. And the guy who made District 9 and Elysium is squarely in the Rod Serling camp except he's a subpar writer and filmmaker so he doesn't get away with it, whereas Rod Serling did.
Rod Serling also had the benefit (benefit for us) of making his biggest show in a time when the studios reigned him in. Lots of Twilight Zone episodes would have been way more preachy if Serling got his way.
All Hollywood movies are propaganda. Once you realize this, you can not unsee it. Schindler's List was not created to entertain you.
I actually wrote an article about this topic using one single movie.
A lot of movies are propaganda and I'd agree that Schindler's List is not meant to entertain you. But if you read my article, I point out how some films were not only entertaining, they were uplifting in their message. In this case, Soldier from 1998.
https://toomanyopinions.substack.com/p/soldier-1998-an-underrated-gem-and
Interesting. Thanks for sharing.
I'm very glad to encounter someone else who appreciates Soldier. I'm currently working on an illustrated novel that borrows heavily from the premise of Soldier. When I mention to people that it's one of my inspirations, nine times out of ten the response is 'Never heard of it'. It's definitely a hidden gem.
That's awesome! Good luck on the novel. I'd be interested in checking that out and buying a copy when you're finished.
Hey i remember that article. Thanks. Got any more good movie recommendations? I suppose it's hard to kick a habit of watching them after consuming them for decades.
I don't have any off the top of my head. Just surface level likes of films. Nothing immediately jumps to mind as far as a deep recommendation. I like all sorts of films, but I don't have anything primed in "analysis" deep terms, just like more like, 12 monkeys is really good and I thought it sucked the first time I watched it, but I really appreciated it this last time I watched it, sort of thing. Surface level.
I think Kubrick made depressing films in a reflection of the state of mind that he was in. He was surrounded by ethnic pedofiles and died for trying to make a movie about them. We can only imagine what sort of stress he had. I didn't like his movies though apart from Shining so i only have a part of the picture.
Have you seen Schindlers list?
Yes, but a long time ago. Black and white, girls dress is red, one of the guys shoots people with a sniper rifle for fun, and I remember the ending where Schindler wishes he had given more away. That's all I remember.