From prehistoric thriller to adventure film, from science fiction to historical reconstruction, from tragedy to musical film, Steven Spielberg explored all the universes. Except one. His own life, which he worked to keep private. However, the filmmaker evoked his destiny in a roundabout way throughout his career, in Encounters of the Third Kind (1978), AND the Extra-Terrestrial (1982), and Catch Me If You Can (2002). He therefore waited for his thirty-fourth feature film to tell the story of his youth, his discovery of cinema and the divorce of his parents, a trauma from which he has not completely healed. “ I never had the courage to face this story head-on », he confided in 2023 during the Golden Globes ceremony, where he received the awards for Best Film and Best Director for The Fabelmanshis most personal work.
It all began in 1952, in a movie theater. On the screen, a train derails in the night. The scene leaves young Sammy, the director’s fictional alter ego, speechless. His parents, Burt and Mitzi Fabelman, took him to see Under the biggest marquee in the worldof Cecil B. DeMille. « This film is not unforgettable, but this accident remained engraved in my memory “, explains Spielberg. Back home, the little 6-year-old boy strives to reproduce the train disaster with his electric train and the Super 8 camera of his father. His vocation was born. After this brilliant introduction, the creator of Indiana Jones talks about his love of cinema, fantastic short films with his sisters, which he transforms into mummies, and, later, the filming before time of an Il we have to save soldier Ryan tinkering with his scout friends, the life lesson of his exuberant uncle Boris, the harassment he is the victim of at school because he is Jewish…
A DECLARATION OF LOVE TO HIS FAMILY
With this story in the form of a game of mirrors, he brings his beloved parents back to life. An engineer father, a pioneer in computing (Paul Dano, all finesse), and a pianist mother (the wonderful Michelle Williams), whose secret Sammy will discover, a harbinger of the couple’s separation, by chance on his editing table. “ Leah, Steven’s mother, was a free thinker. Her imagination permeated everyday life, explains the actress. Even the dishes, she did them with exuberance. She was subject to her own desire. That’s why she couldn’t stay married for long. » the actress also remembers the director’s tears when he saw her dressed, with hair and makeup like her mother.
To declare his love to his family, maestro Spielberg composed magical sequences, such as that of his mother dancing against the light in front of the lit headlights of the family car, or this meeting with John Ford (performed – brilliant idea – by David Lynch!), which will give Sammy, just hired at Universal, his first lesson in cinema, in two words: art and the horizon.
The Fabelmans, Sunday January 5 at 9:10 p.m. on France 2
ISABELLE MAGNIER
