From the terrifying Jaws to
Lincoln's recent portrait,
Steven Spielberg is one of the few
directors to have a varied work.
He experienced all genres,
from adventure to horror,
and even war films.
But who hides behind this director
whose films have moved,
terrified and haunted
the entire world?
That is what we are going to discover
in this new episode of Direct'it.
When the young Steven discovered
cinema, it was a revelation.
He himself says:
"When I understood that
I could improve my life
thanks to cinema,
this tiny medium,
I was extremely pleased with myself,
and with the opportunity to bring
other people to this wonderful world."
Thanks to his short film Amblin',
he ended up signing a contract with
Universal Studios.
He made for them various
series episodes,
including one of the famous
Colombo's inquiries.
He was then asked to make
the TV film Duel,
broadcast on TV in 1971,
and then in the European
dark rooms in 1973.
Duel, a criticism of machines
reflecting the overturn of
our technological society,
was a huge success.
Steven Spielberg's career
was now launched.
Spielberg was offered numerous
project possibilities.
He chose to work on
Sugarland Express.
Unfortunately, this first feature film
was not as successful as Duel.
The film however stressed one of
the director's future recurrent theme:
the separation of a child
from his parents.
The director then heard about
a horror film project.
The job was assigned to Steven Spielberg,
known for his enthousiasm.
Jaws started to chew.
Shooting on water was a real
war against nature,
just like the heroes of the film,
who have to fight the white shark
which terrifies the small coastal
resort of Amity Island.
Thanks to a prestigious cast,
a scenario inspired by Public Enemy,
a neo-classic staging,
the film could only be good.
Plus, this film was the second
collaboration between
the director and his inseparable
musician double: John Williams.
His music was as terrifying as
Spielberg's images.
But no one expected Jaws
to be such a success:
it was the very first
Hollywoodian blockbuster.
After Jaws, Spielberg could
tackle any project.
He then made
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
The film was released in 1977,
the same year as Star Wars.
It was a huge success.
In 1979, the fourth feature film
of Hollywood's new golden boy
was released: 1941.
The scenario, written by
Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale
who later created
Doc Brown and Marty McFly,
really pleased Spielberg.
However, the prank portrayed
in the film
was considered by the spectators
as foolish and humourless.
Spielberg received a big slap in
the face from the critics and the public.
The film nevertheless provided
a payback on the investment.
And thanks to this film, Spielberg met
Kathleen Kennedy,
now the leader of LucasFilm LTD,
who became his producer and confidant.
Lucas, then known throughout the world,
offered Spielberg to make an adventure film.
Spielberg who wanted at the time
to make a James Bond film,
just got "No" as the answer of the producers,
because he was not English.
Lucas told him that the Raiders of the Lost Ark
would outperform James Bond.
After Lawrence Kasdan and Lucas
wrote the film,
the production process started.
Harrison Ford,
Han Solo in Star Wars,
plays the hero who made him famous
around the world:
Indiana Jones.
This was an overwhelming success.
After the shooting of the Raiders,
Spielberg was no longer
looking for the Lost Ark.
He himself declared that he had
nothing more to prove,
except to himself.
Thus, the director's future productions
became far more intimist than they used to be,
but remained entertaining.
The theme of the separation
of a child from his parents
came back in E.T. in 1982.
This event was to be found through
the lonely child thematic,
seperated from his family
in the outside world.
- No!
- Calm down honey...
Mum, please, no!
- Please!
- They'll destroy you, David!
No, I'm sorry I left,
I'm sorry I cut your hair...
I'm sorry I hurt you...
- I have to go.
I have to go!
Please! Stop!
Mum, don't leave me!
- I have to go now, David.
I must leave!
These films, more intimist,
were all very successful.
The Color Purple, a film
about racial segregation,
and Empire of the Sun,
telling the story of a boy
separated from his parents who
survives the Japanese invasion of China.
These films pave the way for
Spielberg's future career.
His cinema then became
more historical and darker.
After Jurassic Park, films like A.I.,
Minority Report and War of the Worlds,
signal the director's return
to science-fiction.
The same issues emerge:
childhood, separation,
but also a new one:
premonition.
Characters are more seeing things
than doing things.
Tom Cruise can't change his future
in Minority Report,
and is powerless against
the alien invasion in War of the Worlds.
However, this kind of science-fiction
is not as enlightened as
it was in Close Encounters of the Third Kind,
and not as chiaroscuro as in E.T.
The plots are dark,
even very dark.
Films no longer have a simple 
happy end but are hopeful,
optimistic, after the dark
and pessimistic situations
the characters faced during the whole film.
In 1993, two Spielberg
films were released:
Jurassic Park,
a pop-corn smelling film,
and Schindler's List.
The film is about
the Jewish Holocaust,
prepared and executed by
the Nazis from 1936 to 1945.
This subject was important
to the director, himself Jewish.
The film is a reminder of
the duty of memory,
and most of all a warning
to ensure this never happens again.
The film was a success and led to
the creation of the Shoah Foundation
which welcomes all the survivors
and their testimony.
The director kept making historical
films with Amistad in 1997,
little known, and then with
Save Private Ryan in 1998.
Spielberg once more tells the story
through the eyes of a character.
In Empire of the Sun,
James Graham sees
the Japanese invasion in China,
the beginning of the Pacific war.
In Schindler's list,
Oscar Schindler sees the Nazis carry out
their plans to exterminate Jews.
And here, Captain Miller sees the allies
arrive in France and the ravages of war in Europe. 
Most of all, with this film,
the director developped
a new cinematographic form
to show war:
a really realistic form,
which influenced the genre forever
and even other genres,
like Malick's Thin Red Line
or HBO's mini series:
Band of Brothers and The Pacific.
Spielberg,
following up on his historical work,
started making portraits.
If we could say that each of his
historical film is a portrait,
from then on, the context
was not so important anymore.
The character became the only
important element.
Since 2006, the director seems
to be making a retrospective of his career.
He came back to historical films
through the eyes of Eric Bana in Munich in 2006,
to adventure films with the fourth
part of Indiana Jones in 2007,
to war films through children eyes
in War Horse in 2011,
and finally to films where he can
have fun and experiment,
with The Adventures of Tintin:
The Secret of the Unicorn in 2011.
Come one, you can't say
it doesn't look like you.
Not bad!
What do you think, Snowy?
What about you?
What's your favorite Spielberg's film?
Did you know...?
Did you know that Steven Spielberg
avoids going to the last day of shooting?
Indeed, at the end of the shooting
of Jaws,
he was sure his team would
throw him into the white shark's mouth
called Bruce.
His production company
was named Amblin
as a reference to the amateur short film
that launched his career.
Plus, he is the CEO of Dreamworks SKG.
News section.
Steven Spielberg is the chairman
of this year's Cannes Film Festival.
His next film will be 
Robopocalypse,
an apocalyptical science-fiction film
based on Daniel H. Wilson's novel.
It is about the revolution
of robots who want to destroy humanity,
and which ends up in an apocalypse.
And let's go to the movies
to rediscover Jurassic Park in 3D!
See you in two weeks!
