Every Steven Spielberg movie ranked, from E.T. to Jaws to … Crystal Skull
A comprehensive look at every film from one of cinema's greatest directors, including Spielberg's latest and most personal project, The Fabelmans
Film Features Steven Spielberg
(Clockwise from bottom left:) E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (Courtesy of Universal Pictures), Jaws (Courtesy of Universal Pictures), Schindler’s List (Allstar/Cinetext/Universal), The Fabelmans (screenshot) Graphic: The A.V. Club
With 34 films and counting under his belt, Steven Spielberg has proven himself one of Hollywood’s most quintessential storytellers. His films satisfy our popcorn-devouring urges, offering awe-inspiring ambition, spectacle, and a distinctive flair. But there’s always artistic merit amid the commercial value—even in his critical misfires, as this painstakingly exhaustive ranking of those 34 titles can attest.
Oh, who are we kidding? Assessing the filmography of one of this generation’s most entertaining directors is no chore. Read on for The A.V. Club’s definitive, iron-clad, don’t-you-dare-question-it ranking of all of Spielberg’s features, from his debut film, Duel, to his newest, The Fabelmans.
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I’d swap Last Crusade and War of the Worlds, JP and ET, and then Jaws and JP. Then Jaws up to first.But I haven’t seen ET since I was 5 or so. No clue if I’d change that
Got to the first (last) entry, saw that Karen Black was incorrectly credited as being in Crystal Skull, sighed, and moved on with my day.
OK, kept going, and gotta say War of the Worlds is WAY too fucking high on the list. It looks great, sure, and the opening invasion is truly thrilling, but 2 hours of Dakota Fanning screeching and an eye-rolling happy ending left me with an indifferent shrug. I usually don’t rail against the rankings in lists like these (the subjectiveness is part of the appeal), but here I must make my stand.
“an eye-rolling happy ending”This kills a lot of Spielberg for me …
I used to avoid movies that had Dakota Fanning in them just to avoid her ridiculous screaming.
War of the Worlds has a lot of great scenes, but as a movie it is kind of meh.
Definitely less than the sum of its parts, even if some of those parts are pretty good. (The scene of first a few, then many, many, bodies floating down the river sticks with me.)
It’s a few great scenes with a flimsy story in between, characters that appear for no reason, and the son suddenly deciding that he needs to go and fight because reasons. A lot wasn’t filmed/couldn’t be finished in post-production in time to meet a deadline for a release date that was brought forward by almost a year while filming was taking place. That said, the scenes where the first tripod rises out of the ground, and the later scene where we see a distant shot of two tripods vaporising crowds of people fleeing the river bank stayed with me for *weeks* afterward.
Also, the original described as “campy”? In a decade filled with cheesy alien and monster invasion films, the original War of the Worlds stands out to me as being a genuinely horrifying film. The special effects have also held up remarkably.
I remember stumbling on that version on TV late one night, and it is unbelievably bleak. Right up until the end it’s just misery and desperate survival.It also made me realised that ‘Independence Day’ is pretty much a remake of it, with the words “computer virus” replacing the words “common cold”.
Agree. How it ranks higher than Minority Report is mindboggling.
War of the Worlds is pretty terrible. A lot of stinkers are way too high on the list (while Temple and Crusade are too low.)
I hated every character in War of the Worlds. I was really rooting for the aliens, so this was a disappointment.
Is “eye-rolling happy ending” a reference to the aliens dying of Earth diseases? Because that’s not only *the* ending of every iteration of “War of the Worlds,” it’s pretty much the entire point.
Oh no, the *actual* ending of War of the Worlds is fine. It’s the “ha, you thought I was dead because obviously I was” kid mentioned in a previous comment.
Would flip WOTW with Minority Report. At least with Minority Report’s happy ending, you can squint and theorize that it’s a dream Cruise’s character is having in his eternal sleep.
You mean the kid who runs over a ridge that is immediately scoured with fire, then shows up at home unhurt?
Exactly.
Karen Allen, obviously.
And let’s not forget the scene in the bunker that is basically just the Jurrasic Park kitchen sequence again, but with aliens instead of raptors and boredom instead of tension.
I’ve never seen E.T. Was 17 when it came to theaters. Saw everything else of the era but that. And still haven’t seen it. Someday.Also, West Side Story too high. Last Crusade too low.
Agreed. Last Crusade is just as good as Raiders of the Lost Ark, IMO. It’s just plainly one of Spielberg’s best overall films and the fact that it’s below West Side Story is atrocious—I didn’t like Spielberg’s take at at all since he cut a number of songs, and neither did my mom, who loves the original a lot and saw the musical on Broadway twice.Catch Me If You Can is also oddly low… Putting it beneath War Of The Worlds should be a crime. Comparing the 2 films on IMBD, Catch Me If You Can sits at an 8.1/10, while War of the Worlds sits at a 6.5/10, one of the lowest scores of any Spielberg film (it’s even lower than Hook, which has a 6.8/10). I’m also a big fan of The Terminal and I think it should be higher on the list, somewhere up near The Post, which I consider to be a bit overrated on this list.
The revelation late in “Last Crusade” was just so surprising to 19-year old me.
“West Side Story is atrocious—I didn’t like Spielberg’s take at at all since he cut a number of songs, and neither did my mom, who loves the original a lot and saw the musical on Broadway twice.”
I can’t help being pedantic… While I had some major issues with the movie (Kushner’s overly wordy script filling in every backstory, the way dance in general was used less as a storytelling device,) it certainly did not cut “a number of songs.” The only major cut from the Broadway score was the Somewhere dream ballet, which also was cut from the original film. No full songs were cut…
Agreed on Crusade, although I would put Temple where Crystal Skull is, so…..
I absolutely love Last Crusade, probably for some/many of the same reasons I love Star Trek VI so much and kind of view Raiders::Last Crusade as Star Trek II::Star Trek VI; I think that the first film in each of those pairings is better, but I like the latter films more and consider them to be outstanding films in their own right. They feature iconic, beloved characters in a way that feels so lived-in and comfortable that it’s just lovely to watch.I do have one minor quibble with Last Crusade, though, and it’s how they made Brody into a buffoon. He had (unless I’m vastly misremembering) a quiet air of competence and intelligence in Raiders but they made him comic relief in Last Crusade.
I wouldn’t go so far as to say ‘Crusade’ is better than ‘Lost Ark’, but I do think in many ways it’s a refinement of what went before. Spielberg really knows what he wants this Indy film to be and he ups the grandeur and the sense of adventure. Plus, I like that we get to see a bit more of who Indy is as a person and how he became that way through Henry Jones Sr. This write-up seems to be saying it’s just more of the same and penalises it for that, but I think it’s one of those sequels that builds on what we’ve already seen.
WotW takes a hit because of the ending, I think. If Spielberg hadn’t tacked on that frustratingly optimistic ending where the brother shows up again, that film would have been much more internally consistent (the movie is bleak as fuck), and probably would jump up at least 5 more slots in a list like this.
I was absolutely bonkers for E.T. when it came out and owned a large amount of the meager merch that was available at the time (including Neil Diamond’s “Heartlight” record!) I was almost exactly the same age as Elliot, which really helped my emotional connection to it. I watched it when the VHS first came out (when I was a teen, I think) and it left me utterly cold.I think I’ll avoid ever watching it again, as I’d rather have it exist as a cherished childhood memory rather than see it through older, jaded eyes.
I doubt I’ll go bonkers for it now, but back in the day I could see myself being a big fan. For many years it just never turned up on cable TV on AMC, TNT, TBS, etc., like so many other films of its era.
Right–I think they treated ET a bit like how Disney originally treated many of its films on video–without many, if any, TV screenings before. When it finally came to video, I remember it being a much hyped Christmas event. I was 8 I think, so probably 1988? It’s funny, I remember seeing the movie in the theatres, and that I was deeply upset that it made my mom cry, but realized I would have only been 2 at the time and was certainly not going to movies–but I see it was reissued (again like Disney films) in 1985, so that must have been when I went.
When E.T. came out, my instincts told me I wouldn’t like it. I finally gave it shot about an year ago. I just don’t understand the hype unless you’re 12 years old. I’d rather watch Flight of the Navigator for kids with cute aliens.
Yeah, I have some general quibbles with this list but there’s no way Crusade should be in the 20s. It’s absolutely as good as the original, suffering only because Raiders was such a blockbuster and it had to live within its shadow.
A creepy, seemingly sentient turd makes a big mess for two hours and is inexplicably described as lovable.
You have missed nothing.
Sweet Odin! How many pieces on the site right now are rankings? I saw three after a quick glance, but I probably missed a few. Enough with the rankings already.
drives engagement by having folks argue in the comments, plus they don’t get paid enough to write pieces with any kind of research involved
I assume “engagement” just means comments. I understand I’m old, and old fashioned. I miss the AVClub that was. I’ve been a daily reader since before the AVClub split from The Onion. 🙁
100% agree ! All of the great writers they had are gone
I think I might be pretty much done with the site , Stuff getting reviews/recaps are shows that I’m not going to be watching as they’re aimed at a different demographic as me (I mean fucking then Gen Z/Millennial stuff like Euphoria I understand …but Yelllowstone???)and most of the articles are BuzzFeed style listicles.Good luck to the writers still here , but your management are driving the place into the ground.
No it doesn’t!
It’s not just AV Club. Every single GMG site does this now. I got banned from Kotaku for making a joke about how lazy it is.
ranking fine, fucking slideshow not.
I prefer rankings because (a) There is far more thought and regard put into these pieces that the various pieces of aggregated snark-filled news that is 90% of this site(b) As stated, it drives more engagement (and better engagement than the lame comedic ramblings of middle-aged failures that do most of the postings in the comments sections, these days)Honestly, this is about as good as it gets, around here.
There are a lot of long time commenters (and newcomers) on this site whose posts are thoughtful. And honestly, I have no way of knowing whether or not they are failures IRL. I try not to judge people solely based on their taste in pop culture. That’s how-to-avoid-being-a-hipster-d-bag 101. And yes, I realize I am almost literally saying “I preferred their early stuff” with my post, which is classic hipster d-bag.
These are obviously decisions being made by the management, whose emails are all available online if you want to complain to the right people rather than journalists trying to make a living.
Are you saying it’s inappropriate to comment about the format of a piece in the comments section for that piece? But OK, where are the emails? I would be happy to write to those people as well.
I just think it’s kinda trite, I don’t think it’s going to change things to just complain in the comments. The names of everyone in charge are on the G/O website and you can google their names + email to find the email addresses.
It’s not a horrible list. I have a soft spot for The Terminal – I don’t think it’s great, but as far as Spielbergian sappy endings go, that film seems to demand one, so I always end up kind of liking it.I know people love West Side Story, but I find it to be a (mostly) beautifully made boring film. Would be near the bottom of my list.
West Side Story was gorgeous, but we already had a near-perfect version of that movie already. And Ansel Elgort is an OK singer until the point when literally anyone else is singing with him and blowing him out of the water. Rachel Zegler was radiant, but I kept watching the movie wondering why it existed.
The movie exists because vocally dubbed and totally wooden Natalie Wood and Richard Beymer in the 60’s version are so amazingly awful in an otherwise good film for its time. Watch the “tonight” scene again as it’s cringeworthy now. Give Ansel credit as that’s his voice and not dubbed like everyone including Academy Award winner Chita Rivera. The Spielberg version is a true masterpiece and should be higher on the list.
I love 1941, saw it in the theatre. It being good is a different question.
There are WAY worse films on this list than The Terminal. It’s pretty slight as filmmaking goes, but it’s not actively bad. Spielberg doesn’t have many of those, but they exist (Always, Warhorse). And Lincoln is way too high on this list. If that movie was any drier, it’d be dessicated.
“Steven Spielberg had a long and well respected career, then he made Indian Jones and the Crystal Skull”
Having seen nearly every movie on this list and most in the theater (ok jaws in the drive in back when it came out), not only are these movies well done. What strikes me is the way they hold up after decades of rewatching and now have generations of fans. Just amazing a movie I saw in the theater in the 70s or 80s I can show my own children and they will love it. (not as much but still love it).Signed a Gen X movie fan.
I’ve been going down movie memory lane with two Gen Z’ers…not my own kids, but my wife’s younger siblings. Back to the Future fell utterly flat, which was a shame. But a TON of Spielberg holds up, it’s pretty crazy.The only director who tops Spielberg in this little retrospective I’ve been doing is David Fincher, but he got his start much later so I don’t think it’s a good 1:1 comparison.
“Back to the Future fell utterly flat, which was a shame.”Yeah, it is a shame you have to disown your wife’s family for their awful taste.
Jalopnik has already done this and explained why the correct answer is Duel as his best film.https://jalopnik.com/duel-is-spielbergs-best-movie-hands-down-1849757052/amp
Duel really does rip. If a car follows me for a lot longer than I think it should I always wonder if I ended up in Duel somehow.
I would have put it much higher on the list. There is not an ounce of fat on that film
Jaws is #1 as it’s the best movie ever made. And this is coming from someone who saw Raiders in a theater in Flushing Queens in 81 when they theater lost it’s shit cheering when Indy appeared on the sub. But yeah good list, very hard to rank. Still Jaws is always #1
I keep looking for overlooked flaws in the film every time I see it. And I never find them. Jaws is probably one of the most perfect films ever made.I don’t even think the shark looks fake.
Same here, I was scared of the Shark as a kid (I think I saw in in 78 on re-release in a shitty theater in queens with part 2) while the Shark’s after part 1 look meh to awful.I can’t find any flaws in it either, the only thing I notice is how drunk for real Shaw was right before his big speech and how they cut to the speech and he sobered up. And I only know this is because they have talked about this in the behind the scene’s shows about the making of Jaws.Star Wars (1st 3) made my childhood but damn if Jaws isn’t my favorite and to me the best movie of my lifetime.
Jaws is my favorite movie as well and probably the best movie ever made, but there are flaws (bloopers, continuity/editing errors, lapses in logic) throughout. Nothing to keep it from being recommended, but still not flawless. DO NOT get me started on any of the sequels as they all are total dogfarts.
Jaws is perfect, but so is Raiders. For that matter, something extremely simple but extremely well made like The Blair Witch Project is also perfect. I love all three of those movies, but for me Raiders > Jaws > Blair Witch because not only does it hit the mark perfectly, it aims the highest.
I first sw that movie about four years ago and fucking despised it. Watching three shitty 70s misogynists jerk themselves off on a boat is a tedious way to spend any amount of time.
Genuinely baffled you see something likeable in that movie. Maybe it’s a ‘had to see it as a kid’ sort of thing, because as an adult over twenty five I was alternately bored and disgusted.
In what universe are the three main leads “misogynists”? Because one makes a casual remark about “Here’s to swimming with bowlegged women”?
Nice try
No, the #1 movie ever made is The Blues Brothers with an able assist from Stephen Spielberg in a pivotal role as the Cook County Assessor.
Saw Jaws at the drive in when I was 8 and it was just released that summer. We got home so late we saw the milk man delivering on our street. There was NO WAY I would go into the back yard pool the next day.
I never learned to swin because of Jaws! I don’t know how many times in the shower over the years when I have soap in my eyes, I start to worry I will open them up and Bruce the Shark will be coming for me!
There was a wave pool near my grandparents’ house that would show Jaws a couple of times each summer for a floating audience. It was pretty awesome.
I grew up summering on the Vineyard where it was filmed—we were all terrified to step into the water.
Raiders is better. Full stop.
For Spielberg films, JAWS is my #1 as well. Great write-up here. I remember being a kid in the theatre (on my birthday) watching the Air Jaws style attack on the Turner boy, and my Dad later saying it was the most realistic attack in the film as the “Fin above the Water” was not the way a predator would attack. Mom would argue with Dad on this, even after their divorce, until she watched Air Jaws on the first Shark Week. I also remember being afraid to swim in the Lake Lanier because of sharks. Mom said “they’re only at the beach” while Dad said “Don’t worry, son. Bull sharks can’t jump over Buford Dam”. He had had an encounter with one along the Mekong when he was a Marine in ‘Nam where he helplessly watched one attack a local kid who did not survive.Man, JAWS brings back the memories.
I have a cousin, who was a bit too young to see Jaws, but he says his two most treasured moments of childhood was 1) Seeing Star Wars in May of ‘77, and Raiders in ‘81. To this day, he says, nothing has come close to matching the excitement and thrill of those two films.
And that’s the thing for me. While Star Wars is the movie who definded me and Raiders was an awesome experience I will never forget…. Jaws still is the only Movie I can watch 10+ times a year (when it’s on AMC etc) and I see that this movie has no flaws. I feel luck that my childhood was around movies like those.
This is pretty much exactly how I feel. Jaws is a different thing. Whether by design, accident, or innate genius, it’s flawless.
The scene at Ben Gardner’s boat with the corpse popping out was shot last as an add-on, so they do not even mention the body when talking to the mayor in front of the billboard, just the tooth that Hooper dropped.
That makes sense as they do only talk about the tooth and the Gardner scene was clearly made to get a jump scare from the audience.
But, this is just a technicality; the film is still amazing. I like that career inflection point where the soon-to-be megadirector is not bigger than the actors in the film yet, and some of the scenes play out more as a collaboration. This point came very early for Spielberg.
lol best movie ever made
“they theater lost it’s shit”Its true, your wright, Jawes is the best moovie ever maid.What are you, in 5th grade again?
The movie’s great, but what makes it legendary is the chemistry between Roy Scheider, Richard Dreyfuss and Robert Shaw. That’s what movies are made of.
Yeah, the Dialog in the movie is awesome. And when you hear about the problems Shaw and Dreyfuss had with each other while filming it, you respect their work even more.
Jaws was all the more terrifying over the fact that for much of the movie, you never actually saw the shark. Most of that was because it wasn’t working (and if you take the Universal Studios tour, you’ll hear Richard Dreyfuss reliving “The shark is not working” while on the set), but I think if the shark had been working for many scenes, it wouldn’t have been as good a film.
Damn right.
Man, that top 6. Peerless!
Man, I love those affordable-ish non-reflex Bolex cameras. 16mm was so goddamn fun to shoot. I kept using that damn thing pictured above until the prices got eye-watering.
Karen Allen, you fucking hacks.
Last Crusade in the bottom half?
Seriously, get fucked.
This list is deeply hilarious.
Oh, well this wasn’t intentionally designed to invite controversy at all.
I don’t think so. This seems like a sincere list. Even the stuff that I disagree with seems well argued
Someone was definitely cackling when they grabbed Minority Report and last Crusade and moved them down the list.
I’m here to stump for Hook. I will live and die for Hook. How dare Hook be so low. You lewd, crude, bag of pre-chewed food dude!
It’s a film I unashamedly love. It helps that Dustin Hoffman played Captain Hook straight out of a British Christmas pantomime. Basically on the same level as Alan Rickman in Robin Hood.
Bob Hoskins was also tremendous.
Hook is super underrated.
While I just skipped to the listing to see that you had the correct #1 (you did), the name of the movie was RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK (or just Raiders for those of us from that era).So it most definitely does’nt have “Indiana Jones” in front of it!
I remember critics and fans being unkind to War of the Worlds. I thought it was visceral and thrilling on the same level as Jurassic Park — both pretty much tailor-made to be watched on a large screen with a booming sound system. Yes, Dakota Fanning is terrible in it. And the ending makes no sense. But it’s fun for at least one viewing.
I thought War of the Worlds was amazing. It falls apart in the last act but everything before that is astounding.I also didn’t know that anybody thinks that 8-year old Dakota Fanning is terrible in that movie. I think it’s one of the best child performances of the past two decades.
I remember it as being pretty good, but on rewatch a couple weeks back, oof, what a horrible flick. I’d rate it as just a wee bit better than Crystal Skull.
People forget how fucking nuts the boat sequence is. Plus people getting ground up, turned into alien fertilizer, and sprayed on plants is some of the darkest shit Spielberg has ever done.
I revisit War of the Worlds every so often, but I’m always surprised at how unrelentingly bleak it is (until the very end of course). It makes Temple of Doom look like a stroll on the beach.
It was hard to buy Tom Cruise as an everyman, when he is… Tom Cruise.
War of the Worlds fucking rules
The movie was a disjointed mess in no small part thanks to its rushed production (it was moved from summer 2006 to 2005 late in the game to accommodate Transformers, which ended up slipping back to 2007 anyway). Dakota Fanning was the best thing about it; she acted Cruise off the screen, IMO.
Hook may be one of his weakest movies, but it is definitely in the top 5 of John Williams’ best Spielberg scores.
Hook may be one of his weakest movies
There are a lot of problems with Hook but to me the main one is that the daughter is virtually forgotten in the last half. Why not just give Peter only one kid?
(Also – Julia Roberts was so bad. I’ve seen the movie a bunch of times [I have children] and it always looks like her scenes were filmed independently of everyone else’s – like months later or something. Maybe they were; I think I remember hearing it was a troubled shoot.)
I would put Bridge of Spies higher up. A very nice low-tech thriller that asks the audience to pay attention. Mark Rylance was absolutely perfect in it.
Not my Spielberg ranking, but the guy has made a ton of great, great movies. Hard to argue too much.
To be fair though – it’s a pretty good ranking. Definitely in my top 10.
return to the decade of the ’40s for his very next film.
Yeah, the original trilogy all take place in the 30s. Which is appropriate, since that was the decade those serials were in theaters.
What I like about this list is that if you take the top 7 movies:1. You could put them in basically any order and be like “yeah, ok.”2. They span multiple genres.3. Each one could arguably be considered “the best [insert genre] movie ever made.”Freakin’ Spielberg, man.
1 – Jaws. 2 / 3 / 4 – Raiders / ET / Schindler 5 – Minority Report6 / 7 / 8 / 9 – Catch Me If You Can / Jurassic / AI / CEOT3K 10 on – the others.The Post and War Of The Worlds are both mid tier at best. Far too high on this list.
Pretty much right there with you but I’d swap AI with Saving Private Ryan.
My hottest take, aside from my hatred for Temple of Doom, is that when you look at the times Spielberg has released two films close together, it’s always one for him and one for them, and The Post feels way more like the “one for them” than Ready Player One does.
Jaws at 1. Raiders at 2. Last Crusade much higher up. Minority Report also top 10 and considerably better than War of the Worlds.
Pretty much my main beefs as well, though it’s hard to get too worked up with Raiders at 1. But MP and Crusade are both fantastic.
It’s just Raiders of the Lost Ark. No “Indiana Jones and.”
I wish that were still true, but alas.
The cover of the 4K agrees with me.
FWIW I agree with you, too. This is how I have them in Plex:I have them sorted as “Indiana Jones [#]” so they appear together, but I kept the original title.Then again, I also keep the Star Wars “Special Editions” distinct from the theatrical releases and refuse to even put the original release dates on them, so take that with a grain of salt. 😀
You need to get out of my Plex server, sir.
Ha! I think the only difference may be that I have the Skywalker Saga in “episode” order rather than order of release. I kind of agonized about that. I have the films outside those nine in chronological order.
I have the original releases separated before the “Skywalker Saga” which is in order from Episodes 1-9.
I can absolutely see the reasoning behind that. It’s a good solution to a weird problem!I think I ultimately decided to keep the “episode” conceit for all nine movies because it started with ESB… if it had started with the prequels I would’ve probably done exactly the same as you did.
So much wrong in this list, but at least you have Raiders in the top spot, so I can forgive the grievous errors.But, dear god, never, EVER call it “Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark.” That’s some late period Lucas revisionist bullshittery. It also makes no damn sense, since Indy is and always has been one of the raiders.
I thought that was a sloppy AVC mistake – you mean they’re actually calling it that now?? C’mon Steven, you’re better than that.
Lucasfilm has been officially calling it that since before the sale to Disney. George wanted all the titles to be consistent or some shit.Spielberg, however, is not. And the opening titles of the movie have not been changed. It’s just on all the merch and whatnot.
And the opening titles of the movie have not been changed.That’s awesome. One of the things I like best about the 4K77 version of Star Wars is the opening crawl without “Episode IV” at the top.
A.I and Empire of the Sun are cinematic masterpieces and should be in the Top Ten. The BFG should not be ranked even one higher than Duel. But good list. Your #2 is my #1 (my top three would be E.T, then a moving list of Jaws and Close Encounters depending on the day). Fabelmans’ not out yet, I have seen all his films except for: The Color Purple, 1941, and Sugarland Express.
What would be far more interesting to me is a listing of all the movies Spielberg executive produced. I’m sure it’s in the 100s, but it’d be fascinating and there are tons of movies he was involved with that people don’t even realize he was (like Galaxy Quest.)
And don’t forget Amazing Stories.
…and Cape Fear.
I have tried many times to forget Amazing Stories. 😉 Well, the WW2 bomber episode was okay.
If you made a list of Spielberg movies he didn’t direct you might want to separate the list from ones he just got an Exec Producer credit on and those he actually got a story/writing credit on. Which there were a LOT of in the 80s (it felt like everything Amblin, and of course the way they were sold a lot of audiences who didn’t pay much attention to these things thought they were Spielberg directed movies.)
I think that “story by” list is limited to Poltergeist and Goonies. Spielberg has very few proper writing credits. In terms of actual screenplay credit, it’s basically Close Encounters, AI and Fablemans.
Ha yeah, I was hoping no one would follow up on that comment of mine, because while I thought he had a LOT more story by credits, when I went to actually look, he… didn’t. Now of course we know there were films he produced and still heavily took part in the story concept (An American Tail and Land Before Time being two examples, if Don Bluth’s recent memoir mentioning how much Spielberg, sometimes not for the good, would interrupt story meetings.)
Yeah, he was often very hands on creatively in films in which he was the EP.
Good point!
Executive producer credit on a move means essentially nothing creatively. Most times it’s just for someone who signed a check at some point.
In some cases, yes, but not always. And, by all accounts, Spielberg was involved creatively in many, many of his big EP-credited movies. He’s not really the kind of guy to just rubber stamp stuff and collect a paycheck.
Poltergeist obvs jumps out. Innerspace is another one. Back to the Future. Men in Black. The Flintstones… ugh, what a missed opportunity. The ones that suck though, would make a list like this interesting.Edit: went to IMDB and looked at a list of producer credits – there’s not a lot that flat-out suck.
Flintstones immediately springs to mind as “one of the ones that suck”, which is why it’d be a fascinating list. With things like “Roger Rabbit” on one end and Flintstones on the other.
Transformers goes firmly at the ‘sucky’ end of that list.
Turns out he was not actually a credited EP on galaxy quest, but rather was working in his capacity as a Dreamworks executive. Basically the same function without the credit.
You lost me at Hook being on the bottom. Get out of here with that. Top 5
Big Theater Kid energy right here.
This comment will never be posted, but whatever – Lincoln is one of the worst movies I’ve ever seen. It’s four hours of bewildered historical exposition through the prism of wooden acting (apart for DDL) and stilted dialog. One person having a great performance while everything around him drips loser does not a great movie make. Thanks.
Thank you! It’s an over-long boring episode of (post-Sorkin) The West Wing.
Exactly! Damn…
Here is the Lincoln Bedroom, which we just call the bedroom.
hahaha
While I wouldn’t go this far, I’d say it might work better as a stage play. Sally Field wasn’t doing it for me. Michael Stuhlbarg was very good though. But I’d agree the rest of the supporting cast kind of blurs together.
The most baffling decision is to not even mention Lincoln’s years of vampire hunting.
Lincoln needs to be higher if for no other reason that the thesis presented in it about why he pushed for the Thirteenth when he did is genuine historical research; there were several articles on that at the time. It also properly points out just how much of the North wasn’t all that enthusiastic about where Lincoln was leading them on race. Hard to find another historical movie that’s had anywhere close to that sort of genuine classroom lesson yet is compelling; in fact, one of the few is Schindler’s List.Swap Post and Bridge of Spies; it was great to see Streep work with him, but the latter was a far better movie.West Side Story is a perfectly fine remake, but it doesn’t have the cultural impact a lot of the films below it did and accomplishes less than the original so should be far lower.Amistad is a bit better than you give it credit for as is Terminal; AI is a long, weird drag that just doesn’t work well.
You’re right. Lincoln does make a fine book.
I don’t get putting The Post in tenth place. It’s well-done but so dull especially compared to a truly lively historical Spielberg film like Lincoln. At one point seeing this, I saw everyone on my row had fallen asleep midway through right before I took a quick nap myself.
I make no apologies for loving 1941.
1941 is a mess, but an entertaining mess, and it knows how hot Nancy Allen is
For a time, Spielberg was the master at deflating the reverence and empty promises of suburban American ideals. Looking past the aliens and action scenes in Close Encounters and E.T. there’s a defter dissemination of the breakdown of the family unit than he gets credit for.
I liked Empire of the Sun when I saw it but wished he kept his camera crane at home. He made a concentration camp look great and I think that’s the problem with that film above all else. Duel should be ranked higher. It does leak some of its TV movie qualities from time to time, but it’s the leanest thing he ever made and still holds up. I have a soft spot for A.I. too even though it doesn’t completely work. I think the ending works better than the bland, unimaginative pinocchio references.1941 is one of his most curious entries. It’s not good but each scene works better on its own than part of the whole. Sort of a like an album with good songs that don’t go together. If only Spielberg had approached it as 32 Short Films about 1941 instead…
Jaws always gets my vote as his best film.
The best Spielberg movies, for me, hit a level so good and so immersive that you forget they’re Spielberg movies. I can’t think of a moment in Raiders where I’d pump my fist and go “Spielberg!” It’s clicking on so many levels that the director’s personal flourishes fade and blend in with everything – thus its near perfection. Jaws gets there too. Maybe it’s the absence of little kids. He definitely has a gear shift when kids are on screen.
This list is hot trash and likely bad on purpose to generate angry comments.
Yours was pretty restrained, though. Let’s hear some anger!
That scene where the old lady (who had glared at tom hanks in bridge of spies) nodded approvingly at him after reading about his heroics was the worst scene in any movie
Minority Report deserves to be top 10. West Side Story deserves to be bottom 10. Otherwise, yeah pretty close!
“there’s no denying the thrill of seeing Spielberg re-create scenes from Kubrick’s The Shining or deliver an epic battle between every character you grew up loving”Yes there fucking is.
Spielberg was absolutely the wrong person to make that film, not in the least because it draws so heavily from his own work, rather than nostalgia for watching them.
It was tailor made to be a JJ Abrams movie.
Spielberg is today’s William Shakespeare. Entertainment for the masses. Some dramas, some comedies, some historical stuff. Some really good, some forgettable, a lot of average.
Minority Report and AI are way way too low, Crystal Skull is exactly where it should be. And I can’t really argue with the placement of Jurassic Park, but it’s pretty amazing that any filmmaker could have not just one movie better than that but a solid half dozen.
AV Club have Ready Player One a B, and the blurb in this ranking is largely positive, so it seems weird that it’s so near the bottom.I wouldn’t put it in the top 10, obviously, but there’s a decent chunk of ones above it I would put below it.
Duel is better than Minority Report or War of the Worlds IMO. For the technological and financial limitations, Duel is incredible.
This list is really bad. The Post, War of the Worlds, and Westside Story are way too high; while A.I. and 16-13 are some of his most complex and thoughtful films. Its almost as if his best work was stuffed in the middle.
There’s no way that The Post can rank that high. It has a scene where a shot of a paper coming off the printing press transitions to a full on newsboy selling it on a street corner. Fucking come on! That is such a dereliction of good taste.
Putting Duel at 26 is basically madness. It’s easily one of the tightest / best of his films, and demonstrates his actual skill as a director before all the cash turned his films into special effects buffets. This is -his- Reservoir Dogs.
34. Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull (2008)33. The Terminal (2004)32. Ready Player One (2018)31. Hook (1991)30. Always (1989)29. 1941 (1979)28. The Sugarland Express (1974)27. Amistad (1997)26. Duel (1971)25. The BFG (2016)24. The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)23. Indiana Jones And The Temple Of Doom (1984)22. The Adventures Of Tintin (2011)21. Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade (1989)20. Bridge Of Spies (2015)19. War Horse (2011)18. A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001)17. The Color Purple (1985)16. Empire Of The Sun (1987)15. Minority Report (2002)14. Munich (2005)13. Catch Me If You Can (2002)12. Lincoln (2012)11. War Of The Worlds (2005)10. The Post (2017)9. The Fabelmans (2022)8. West Side Story (2021)7. Jurassic Park (1993)6. Close Encounters Of The Third Kind (1977)5. Saving Private Ryan (1998)4. Schindler’s List (1993)3. Jaws (1975)2. E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (1982)1. Indiana Jones And The Raiders Of The Lost Ark (1981)
34 point slideshow? No thanks.
I was kind of hoping you’d include his early TV work, like the “Murder By The Book” episode of Columbo or the “Eyes” segment of the Night Gallery movie. Still my favorite:
Okay I haven’t seen (The Fabelmans, The Post, Bridge of Spies, WarHorse, Tintin, or The Terminal) but I have a lot of issues with this list. Let’s go top to bottom for my 28 Spielberg films:JawsE.T. (Magnum Opus)Close Encounters (Unspoken Masterpiece) RaidersJurassic ParkSchindler’s ListCatch Me If You CanMinority ReportSaving Private Ryan (Honestly…start is great, final battle sequence is great, but a lot of the characters are forgettable)Last CrusadeTemple of DoomMunichHook (I see Hook get tossed to the back of Spielberg lists all the time, but it’s an instantly rewatchable film, A.I.DualSugarland ExpressEmpire of The SunLost WorldThe Color PurpleWar of The Worlds (Can’t believe AVclub puts this over Minority Report and A.I…Crazy)Ready Player One (at least it has the Shining sequence)Lincoln (Shameless Oscar Bait)West Side Story (Would be hire if Ansel could act)Amistad (Shameless Oscar Bait)1941
The BFG (Huge misfire, bottom of the Dahl adaptation tree)AlwaysCrystal Skull (I mean what was anyone thinking…)
I’m sorry…but if we’re ranking the Indy movies, Last Crusade is by far the best one, and by no means are ANY of the Indy movies Spielberg’s best. Jaws should absolutely be number one as it’s a master class of filmmaking.
No Poltergeist?
Not technically his movie. Its my favorite horror movie and I’d put myself in the camp that it was probably at least half directed by Spielberg, but there’s still plenty of Tobe Hooper in there, and that’s who’s name was on the slate.
I agree, I’m mostly teasing. I’ve heard enough that I do believe Hooper was the main guiding force behind the movie.
People never talk about how Temple of Doom explains why Indy is an invincible superhero in the rest of the movies; he drinks that magical demon blood and never takes any kind of antidote
He drank from the grail before or after. Either way I’m not particularly keeping track of the impossibilities while watching great escapist movies.
“The Color Purple” seems like somebody from Epcot shot it, like it’s a glossy, high-tech ride designed to convey poverty.
I understand why people shit on Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, but there are at least 3 movies on this list that deserve to be ranked below it. And that would be Ready Player One, The Lost World, and Hook, which is Spielbergs worst by far. But I wholeheartedly agree Raiders is his best. And I appreciate that the AV Club avoided the natural, and understandable, inclination to rank it behind more popular choices. Which is weird to say about one of the most beloved movies of all time, but few would have quibbled if Raiders was ranked behind Jaws, ET, Private Ryan, and Schindlers List. Raiders is my choice, but I know I would have been OK with it ranking behind all 4 four of those films.
“there’s no denying the thrill [of seeing] an epic battle between every character you grew up loving”
Yeah, there is. Because it’s grotesque. Watching the Iron Giant in a huge punch-’em up sucks shit, he deserves so much better. It’s The Uliamte Showdown of Ultimate Destiny without the early-aughts irony, catchy tune, or blessedly short run-time.
I think this is a fine list which shows the breath of his work, but a little predictable (albeit some surprises too).I certainly wouldn’t put The Post that high, but I think 21st century Spielberg is underrated in some ways. I’m not a big fan of Saving Private Ryan, sure the first 25 minutes is terrific filmmaking, but it loses it steam in the middle, its politics are a bit muddled and lazy. I guess I may be in the minority here, but E.T. really doesn’t do much to anything for me. I think War of the Worlds, Minority Report, Munich, War Horse, among others have a lot to offer. I think A.I. is seeing more of a reappraisal overtime too. Munich is a big one for me as that film avoids many of the irritating tendencies Spielberg is known for. I think having Tony Kushner write it may have helped, and I am also a fan of West Side Story and looking forward to The Fabelmans.No doubt this man knows how to shoot a film, refreshing to see those lovely dolly shots in WSS. Also, I would totally welcome another musical from this guy. So many memorable moments throughout his filmography, i.e., the first tripod attack in War of the Worlds is stellar.
I think Spielberg is incapable of making a truly bad movie. Some are better than others, sure, but not outright bad; he’s just too good of a storyteller.And that includes Crystal Skull; I have yet to understand why everyone craps on that film so much. Sure, it’s the weakest of all the Indy movies, the CGI is at times shit, and some of the cast is just taking up space (John Hurt and Ray Winstone were badly used), but it’s a serviceable action movie that largely works.The aliens are not an issue; everyone blames Lucas for this, when after both ET and Close Encounters it should be obvious that it’s Steven who’s fascinated with extraterrestrials. In the context of Indy’s adventures, there shouldn’t be an issue. But all of a sudden people were crying that Indy surviving a nuclear blast inside a fridge is way out there and were demanding absolute realism from a series where someone once survived falling out of a plane on a raft, or, like in this movie, survived three consecutive drops from giant waterfalls.When the movie premiered here in Peru, I remember several critics being absolutely outraged that they got so many geographical/cultural aspects of our country wrong, actively encouraging viewers to boycott the film. And while I agree that Spielberg and Lucas could have just read Wikipedia for a couple of minutes, I’m not about to demand realism from a series that once again, has a guy surviving a nuclear blast inside a fridge, or Nazis getting their faces melted off by the Power of God. The movie had problems (way bigger problems than just “Shia is swinging with monkeys on vines, so this must be shit”), but it just felt like everyone was being incredibly picky.
“Arguably, the prevalent nostalgia for the ’80s, even by those who weren’t alive to experience it, could be credited to Spielberg, as Hollywood has continuously adjusted its bike gears in an attempt to keep up with the course set by Amblin.”What in the actual fuck is this sentence.