Steven Spielberg’s childhood told in the film “The Fabelmans”

It’s a dive into the memories of a great director: Steven Spielberg. As a child, he was fascinated by a train accident that happened on the big screen. His mother then offers him a deal that will change his life: film the derailment of his train himself and watch the film until he is no longer afraid. It is the birth of a vocation told 70 years later by the American filmmaker. “It’s a very personal story, it’s the first time I’ve made intimate things public”, says Steven Spielberg. However, the film is not called the Spielbergs, but “The Fabelmans”.

“A testament film that overflows with youth”

But it is the intimacy of his family that the director restores as the separation from his parents, a trauma that is still very much alive, according to the actor who plays the father in the film. From “ET” to “Jurassik Park”, Steven Spielberg has always filmed family stories. But he waited for the disappearance of his parents to tell his own. “It’s a testament film that overflows with youth and youthfulness, with a spirit of childhood”, thinks Nicolas Schaller, film journalist at L’Obs. In the United States, although it was his most personal and sincere work, the film was a failure.