The Fabelmans

Those who love filmmaking will love The Fabelmans. Spielberg is still in superb form, and it's hardly a surprise that if anyone should tell his life story, it can only be him. A beautiful, sensitive, witty, and moving film that is undoubtedly one of the best of the year. When Spielberg retires, anyone watching this film (remembering all his blockbusters) will be able to tell that it was all worth it. (11/01/2023)

Grand shots of intimate life struggles and little scenes in which the most important things happen. Steven Spielberg has perhaps never built his classic family backdrops so high, illuminated with all manner of imaginary spotlights, and focused his attention solely on them. What's more, Janusz Kamiński's playful camera loves the landscape, architecture, and people so sincerely that The Fabelmans speaks to me in a much more optimistic language than you would expect from the story and some of its twists. (21/02/2023)

It’s no coincidence that such a beautiful film about people and filmmaking is an autobiographical statement by the creator of the most heartfelt works of cinema. The circle is closed, as the unique tenderness of the iconic filmmaking triumvirate of Spielberg + Kamiński + Williams merges with the content like never before. Everything led up to this. ___ The Fabelmans is the most comprehensively told family drama that I have ever seen. And even though no tragic events happen, it is also the most impactful family drama for me personally. It is a deeply felt depiction of the life events of childhood and youth in the smallest yet most essential details, embodied in an appropriately sensitive, surgically precise film narrative. A mosaic of fragments forming the personality of a man who, through pain and joy, became one with the film camera, which revealed the origins of his biggest (family) disappointment in his adolescence and helped him to gracefully resolve his problem with bullying in high school. That he later went on to make his mark on the artistic and social history of the world with that camera is another story. ___ The cinephilic dimension of The Fabelmans is a bonus added to the narrative about family values, which have always formed the essence of Spielberg’s work. Except here he has made it a key part of the story that’s even nicer than we could have wished for. The casting surprise in the epilogue and the last shot brought me to my knees and took me back to a place to which I feared contemporary cinema would never return. Steven forever ❤️ (05/12/2022)

Full Steven Spielberg. Without metaphor for the first time, he looks back on his childhood, on the family background that shaped him and (thankfully) gave him to us. Not that the proverbial perfectionist didn't pay attention to his previous films, but this time it's a truly admirable piece of watchmaking that may not even look like it. Spielberg firstly conveys the viewer's fascination with cinema, wrapping them around his finger with his boyish excitement of a train wreck reenactment, and then making them an invisible member of the family, letting them experience everything he himself has experienced with the characters. And he does it so naturally, confidently and beautifully that it's clear why he made the film. Had someone else been behind the camera, The Fabelmans would have been either a cheesy ode to the best director of all time or a cold family drama that would have been hard to watch. But to find a balance between these two extremes, none other than Steven Spielberg could have done it. PS: And the actors! (26/11/2022)

Sammy Fabelman loves cinema. Together with his friends and family he makes small amateur films and dreams of becoming a director. But then, through his hobby, he uncovers a nasty secret from his loved ones that makes him rethink everything he's ever known. Steven Spielberg delivers a semi-autobiographical story that is moving, funny and above all believable. And while it's also nostalgic and melancholy, it never feels cloying. An honest and audience-friendly drama from a storyteller who understands his job damn well. (24/11/2022)