“The Fabelmans” (2022) is Steven Spielberg’s most personal film and a conscious cinematic attempt at autofiction, autobiography mixed with fictional elements as opposed to most films stating that real life inspired the film, or the movie is an autobiography. It begins on January 10, 1952 when Sammy Fabelman (Mateo Zoryan) saw his first movie with his parents and ends with a now adult Sam (Gabriel LaBelle) entering the professional film industry.
While I enjoy Spielberg’s work, I was not enthusiastic about seeing “The Fabelmans.” From “A.I.: Artificial Intelligence” (2001), “Catch Me If You Can” (2002) to “War of the Worlds” (2005), I have been uncomfortable getting an unintentional glimpse at Spielberg’s psychological issues with his parents—remote, unfaithful mothers, sad sack, inadequate dads unable to reunite the family then issues with women and trying to even the score. I just wanted to send him a note begging him to get therapy. I was uncertain whether I wanted to watch that content for two hours thirty-one minutes. There is one thing to know about a Spielberg movie—it will stay in theaters long after its release date, and it is going to get nominated for an Oscar so I had a ton of time to get over my reservations: almost three months to be exact.
While I would not consider “The Fabelmans” one of the best films in 2022, I would consider it one of Spielberg’s best films to date, and if he gets all the awards, I will understand. Spielberg’s wheelhouse is to make uplifting, upbeat, energetic and conventional films. To be fair, Spielberg sets the standard for what is conventional so what is now considered conventional could have been audacious compared to his contemporaries. While he flirts with danger and scares, the bad guy is obvious and loses.
“The Fabelmans” adheres to none of those standards and embraces complicated messiness. It is an autofiction piece, but it is also a parallel character study of himself and his mom, Leah, in the form of Mitzi Fabelman (Michelle Williams), and about how they both find true love despite feeling as if they are wrong for doing so. It is his most generous film to date because of his depiction of how every single character is too complex to categorize as right or wrong. Every character has hopes and heartaches, and he sympathizes with them. Spielberg has grown beyond casting blame and moralizing for now. It is all pure emotion and empathy though he holds space for that past self who needed to place people in categories such as villains or heroes.
“The Fabelmans” lingers a beat too long on moments to convey emotion and make us want to move on, but Spielberg makes us stay and experience his emotion second hand. Spielberg creates suspense in quotidian details such as what will Sammy want for his Hanukkah present, a visiting family member as an omen or looking at family movies. His final shot made me love him for what it symbolized. There are a few prose dump moments, but I considered them necessary, not extraneous, because he depicted complex emotions and the underlying connection to the surrounding events was not obvious such as when a favorable depiction of an enemy shakes Sam and his bully.
At the beginning of “The Fabelmans,” Mitzi defines movies as “dreams you never forget,” but that becomes an unintended threat. While Spielberg is not religious, the Old Testament’s take on dreams is prophetic and comes with a huge burden. Dreams can be nightmares that you may prefer to forget. Before watching his first movie, little Sammy is an anxious boy, and afterwards, he gains confidence by living his life behind the camera and dwelling on the trauma.
Movies serve two functions. On one hand, movies can be traumatic, and his first movie is violent and inappropriate for a child, which seems like a bad idea for a little neurotic boy. On the other hand, he can become brave by controlling the trauma, externalizing his anxieties, and dissecting them instead of internal perseverating and paralysis; thus Sammy becomes fascinated with train wrecks. Movies do not dwell on the good times, and they act as vehicles to work through daily issues, but they also create new traumas. Movies dwell on worst case scenarios, including some that we will never experience, and somehow movies bring us joy. This work/life of constant examination makes him more perspicacious about the world around him. He discovers new things to worry about and predicts his family’s disruption long before his parents knew.
Spielberg depicts and does not fully understand how his gift works—why film makes him and his audience gain (unwanted) insight into people, which may have always been there, but only becomes visible on film. He is compelled, and the gift is a burden, which is why Sam prefers to make films about experiences which he has never had: Westerns, war movies, etc. It also explains why he toys with the idea of giving it up. He feels guilt over this exposure of himself and others. There is a great scene with Judd Hirsch at his best, which touches on it, but this truth telling cannot be articulated. LaBelle and Zoryan take great turns at depicting the wellspring of feeling without a lot of dialogue.
“The Fabelmans” also depicts women who feel three dimensional: his mother, Reggie (Julia Butters), his little sister who intuits the dangers of Sam’s gift and the deep unhappiness in their family but is unable to understand or stop it, and the wacky Jesus freak girlfriend, Monica (Chloe East), who walks the fine line of being the most outlandish, almost cartoonish, cringe character, but also the most grounded for splashing cold water in his face about reality, “Sometimes we can’t fix things. We can only suffer.” Spielberg critiques himself through Sam’s sisters dialogue when they upbraid him for not having enough women or girls as protagonists—“The Color Purple” (1985).
“The Fabelmans” held one surprise for me. While I considered the recreations of Spielberg’s childhood Arizona films a bit long and self-indulgent, the shift to an inhospitable, anti-Semitic California made it retroactively germane. Spielberg shows that Sam felt at home and accepted in Arizona, a Benetton mix of brown and white children where his ethnicity was never an issue, even compared to his early days in New Jersey where the difference between him and his neighbors is visible during December. Sam collaborates and leads versus being plunged among the impassable, giant white teens of California who see Sam’s mere existence as an act of war. It becomes a David and Goliath story and explains why Spielberg’s “West Side Story” (2021) relates more to the Sharks and hates the Jets. This film’s Chad (Oakes Fegley), a self-professed anti-Semitic bully, could easily get dropped among the Jets, and he would not be accused of being an intruder. Logan (Sam Rechner), Chad’s enabler, could easily get swapped out for West Side Story’s Tony (Ansel Elgort) as dangerous but persuadable.
Controversial hot take: has Spielberg considered that while he is predominantly heterosexual and into the opposite sex, he may have a touch of attraction to men based on their looks? At least he is so confident in his masculinity, that he is one of the few heterosexual men confident enough to appreciate another man looking like Adonis. Neither Logan nor Tony deserves his admiration, yet they have it, and Sam within “The Fabelmans” and Spielberg directing “West Side Story” never conveys why they see more in them than there is, but the answer is obvious. They are tall, blond, and muscular compared to most teens and young men. Good looks equal good character…except it does not. Can we arrange a lunch between Spielberg and Clive Davis? Spielberg has some more exploring to do.
Kudos to Spielberg for really going there by exploring the other side of repressed Christian sexuality. Monica is boy crazy, and her wall is devoted to teen idols and Jesus. A half-naked Jesus on the cross suggests a whole other meaning, and her prayers are weighted with so much innuendo. It also explains why all the Christian girls liked talking to Sam—reductive and problematic, but comprehendible. Also while Spielberg’s parents are dead so cannot be asked, I wonder if a lot of their problems could have been solved if they knew about polyamory and were willing to explore it. Burt (Paul Dano in an uncharacteristically non-villainous role) seemed like the type of man willing to explore it.
