Seitz's blog dissects Hoberman's ludicrous Spielberg bashing

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J.'s interp of the twin towers shot at the end of Munich is especially ridiculous.

Something less than artist [oh Jesus], Spielberg is also something more. He is the institution personified—the genius of the system, the whole Oscar Night shebang in one bearded, baseball-hat-wearing package.

http://www.vqronline.org/articles/2007/winter/hoberman-spielbergization/

Matt Seitz and other weigh in under Comments:

http://mattzollerseitz.blogspot.com/2007/01/links-for-day-january-24th-2007.html

It's interesting that Hoberman -- like so many critics before him; it's kind of a go-to comparison -- likens Spielberg with Hitchcock and Disney. But aside from snarky allusions to Spielberg's cultural conservatism, he doesn't follow the comparison through to what I think is a fair conclusion: that Spielberg is as significant to American popular culture as Disney or Hitchcock, and as reflective of the national temperament, but in terms of style and content, he's far more adventurous than either... I love Spielberg, but I have to accept -- and have said many times in print -- that he's very middlebrow in his aspirations, that his radical tendencies are counterbalanced, often eclipsed, by his aesthetic conservatism ... But he's a hell of a lot deeper and more complicated than Hoberman is inclined to grant, and he's so significant in so many ways that I think we've collectively gotten to the point where a failure to take Spielberg seriously as an artist or a pop culture figure indicates a lack of seriousness on the part of the critic.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 24 January 2007 17:56 (eighteen years ago)

Except that the real problem for certain Spielberg boosters isn't that certain people don't take him seriously as an "artist or a pop culture figure", but rather that some people just don't like or are engaged by his work. And that doesn't indicate "a lack of seriousness" or whatever, just a difference of opinion.

― Alex in SF (Alex in SF), Wednesday, 24 January 2007 18:43 (eighteen years ago)

yes, but to say he's "less than an artist" is BS. He may be an artist of dubious merit (I'm conflicted on Disney, especially post-Snow White), but he's not a widget maker. Somehow Hoberman reconciles that he's a "great manipulator of the medium" and "less than artist," which is familiar but the kind of distinction usually reserved for Leni Riefenstahl.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 24 January 2007 19:00 (eighteen years ago)

Well I'm certainly not going to bother defending Hoberman's convoluted argument (hell outside of the sentence above I'm not even going to read it) but I think that generally most of Spielberg's detractors are not using a Spielberg = Riefenstahl argument.

― Alex in SF (Alex in SF), Wednesday, 24 January 2007 19:26 (eighteen years ago)

Robert Kolker's "A Cinema of Loneliness" offers a more detailed, careful and ultimately stinging indictment of Spielberg's style and choice of content, as well as Spielberg's image and the whole idea of "Spielbergization." Much of what Kolker says can't really be argued with; I love Spielberg, but I have to accept -- and have said many times in print -- that he's very middlebrow in his aspirations, that his radical tendencies are counterbalanced, often eclipsed, by his aesthetic conservatism (spell-it-all-out monologues, reassuring codas, one-bad-apple dismissals of government malevolence, some egregiously racist caricatures in early movies like "1941" and the Indiana Jones films, etc). But he's a hell of a lot deeper and more complicated than Hoberman is inclined to grant, and he's so significant in so many ways that I think we've collectively gotten to the point where a failure to take Spielberg seriously as an artist or a pop culture figure indicates a lack of seriousness on the part of the critic.

otm

― latebloomer: crapness 2 the Nth degree (latebloomer), Monday, 29 January 2007 15:48 (eighteen years ago)

The idea of taking pop seriously is always going to be a hollow pursuit to some people. As is taking those people seriously.

― Eric H. (Eric H.), Monday, 29 January 2007 17:09 (eighteen years ago)

hmmmm, but Hoberman was cuckoo for Borat.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Monday, 29 January 2007 17:29 (eighteen years ago)

Yeah, most everybody can also prove remarkably picky about what pop films deserve to be saved from the multiplex ... shockah.

― Eric H. (Eric H.), Monday, 29 January 2007 18:11 (eighteen years ago)

I just hope it's true:

http://www.nypost.com/seven/01282007/gossip/pagesix/why_hitch_shunned_spielberg_pagesix_.htm

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Monday, 29 January 2007 18:57 (eighteen years ago)

"the fish movie" hahaha.

Seitz otm, otherwise. part of the problem is that Spielberg films cause such radical cognitive dissonance that they are HARD to figure out, they dont lend themselves easily to "is it good or not?" criticism. is AI good? i dont even know if that's a answerable question!

― ryan (ryan), Tuesday, 30 January 2007 05:17 (eighteen years ago)

this thread would have like a gazillion answers on ILE, so kudos for hiding it here!

― ryan (ryan), Tuesday, 30 January 2007 05:18 (eighteen years ago)

The pro-Spielberg backlash comes primarily out of Spielberg's name being used as a shorthand for everything that's supposed to be wrong with American blockbuster movies when he's in fact one of the few things that's right about them.

― A-ron Hubbard (Hurting), Tuesday, 30 January 2007 07:31 (eighteen years ago)

is A.I. great is the difficult question.

You are not gonna catch me posting anything Steve-related on ILE. or about Grindhouse.

― Dr Morbius (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, 30 January 2007 15:27 (eighteen years ago)

Well, he and Lucas arguably invented them.

If Spielberg is what's right with blockbuster movies, why are so many of his films so tedious? I mean, I love ET and Close Encounters and Jaws and some others here and there, but he has made a lot of stuff that I would prefer to not watch again.

― polyphonic (polyphonic), Tuesday, 30 January 2007 18:40 (eighteen years ago)

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