And Kurosawa was heavily influenced by Western cinema and the techniques and traits of directors like John Ford, Fritz Lang and Sergei Eisenstein. What's your point? All directors are influenced by the work of those who came before them, there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. And Spielberg has been very open about his influences and inspirations, stating that the four movies he watches religiously before directing a film are The Searchers, Seven Samurai, Lawrence of Arabia and It's a Wonderful Life. He's not 'getting away with' anything, nor is he trying to.
no problem at all with being influenced by other directors. all i was saying is that ALL his directional style has to offer is something another director had already done (it's like tarantino, but less obvious). and i meant that people think that he did all this things because he's a cinematic genious, when all he did was copying kurosawa's long takes (the ridiculously dubbed "spielberg oner" in one of the videos you linked is the best example)
This is EXACTLY how he is described by anyone with eyes and the ability to understand composition, framing, blocking and camera movement; from Scorsese to Coppola to Bogdanovich to Lumet to Lean to Wilder to Herzog, all have commented on Spielberg's natural directorial and storytelling talent.
i sure have the ability of understanding a good composition (etc) and i don't agree. i rewatched jaws last night. the town meeting scene is, in it's camera work, really bad. people praise that shot where the main character is not centralised but supposedly still is the main focus for the audience's eye. it did not work for me, since all the time i was staring at the giant bald head that filled the entire right half of the screen, and above all it looks really ugly. it's NOT the best place to put the camera. also, there's a lot of suspense scenes where he cuts underwater, and that kills the whole tension. and his "blocking" (as much as i find this term to be dumb) is nothing special. actually, nothing he does is actually special. and i doubt all this superior directors sucked his balls as you said they did. all wilder said, for exemple, was "schindler's list is a good film".
Ah, so it's an anti-American thing, then. Nice of you to outline your bias so succinctly. I'm not American either but I can still recognise filmmaking talent when I see it, and Spielberg has it in spades.
no. i never said that. all i said is that most people who tend to like his films are american. that was literally all i said. i really can't see how you could see this as an "anti american" thing. you're just trying to create a extreme political argument in a discussion about art to make me look bad. it's cheap.
and seriously, did you really link videos from "wannabe film school" youtubers? i thought you were talking about directors and professionals opinions on spielberg's work. not obvious 20 years old spielberg fans' opinions in youtube. after that, i can't respect you less.
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