He's got a new (Oscarbait) movie out in LINCOLN, which has gotten pretty good early reviews so far, so yeah this is a good opportunity to bring up The Beard and his movies.

You know growing up very young before my cinemaphilia took over my life, he was one of three directors I knew by name along with Tim Burton and John Carpenter, and that's only because they had their names plastered on their films and everywhere as brand names. But undoubtedly there was Spielberg, king of the movies, followed by everybody else. For the longest time, I still remember the Top Box-Office hits in history were almost just about mostly Spielberg films.

But as times have passed, inflation set in (especially in ticket prices), I believe now officially his highest grossing movie ever is only in the #25-30 range, and that was JURASSIC PARK, which once upon a time was the #1 hit ever. Certainly no longer the big cheese, like his filmmaking contemporaries he's faded into the background as an elder statesmen, still producing good movies (sometimes) but he's not the hot shit in town anymore like your Christopher Nolan or J.J. Abrams or Peter Jackson or Marvel or whoever currently are today.

(Though I'm sure his pricey divorce from Amy Irving is a warning story for anybody with money and marrying people who know you have money. Seems like in Hollywood, you're the weirdo if you don't end up losing your shirt more than once.)

Anyway if I highlight his movies, I'll most likely than not avoid his best known, biggest hits. When he dies and departs onto the mothership in the sky to go meet E.T., he'll be remembered for JAWS and CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND and RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK (which might just be my favorite movie ever) and E.T. and JURASSIC PARK and SCHINDLER'S LIST and so forth. As they should be I suppose since they're classics.

So instead I'll talk up his underrated, usually not so mentioned good movies. For example, his stunning, riveting directorial debut DUEL which was originally filmed as an ABC TV Movie of the Week in what arguably might just be the greatest made-for-TV movie ever produced. In what might retrospectively could be seen as JAWS on the highway, Dennis Weaver is a salesman stalked and terrorized by a truck driver. Why is he doing this? Who is he? Who cares? A terrific afternoon killer.

Scored great ratings, great write-ups especially for a TV film and eventually released to theatres overseas with more footage shot by Spielberg. Definately worth Netflixing sometime. (or *cough* watch it in another thread.)