Save this article to read it later.
Find this story in your accountsSaved for Latersection.
This article was originally published in October of 2015.
Weve updated it to includeThe Fabelmans.
Heres our ranking of all 34 of Spielbergs feature films, includingThe Fabelmans, out this week.
What was the draw?
No wonder Spielberg has spent every opportunity since thenapologizing.
We get it, we get it:We need to hold on to our inner child.
Spielberg would later joke that the film should have been a musical.
All told, that might not have been the worst idea.
You leave this movie with sugar in your eyes.
ButThe BFGnever quite springs to life it always feels more like a theoretically entertaining film than an actual enchantment.
And a Spielberg movie without Spielbergs soul and essence underneath isnt nearly good enough.
Its a technical marvel that never lets up on the visual pizzazz.
Pity that the characters and the dialogue arent nearly as wondrous.
Still, its good-hearted enough that you go along with it regardless.
Butother than that, this movie is nonstop adrenaline, with Spielberg hell-bent on toppingRaiders stunt sequences.
He burnishes without white-washing, enobles without sanctifying.
Amazingly, theyd make an even more intense film their second time together.
Spielberg deftly mixes in real-life post-9/11 anxiety to this end-of-the-world story to create something that feels legitimately apocalyptic.
There is obviously not a happy ending, though we see the smallest glimmer of hope.
That sense that youre the only one who understands, yet no adults will listen to you.
That palpable, screaming loss of a friend.
community spirit that feels almost painfully yearning today.
This is the movie that Spielberg has said he feels the closest to, and its no wonder.
Its all the more powerful because there was never a sequel: Nothing could soil the experience.
But hes never made one this flat-out, top-to-bottom perfect.
And Spielberg is having a ball.
A lot of people blame him for the advent of the blockbuster/event movie.
But its not his fault that none of his disciples can make em as brilliantly as he did here.
