Film review: ‘THE FABELMANS’ by Nick Gardener from ‘Built For Speed’
The Fabelmans, the latest film from Steven Spielberg, is a semi fictionalised account of the director’s early life. That’s in no way apparent from the title which sounds more like the name of a 1950’s family sitcom. That title, however, not only reminds us that this is not a straight biopic but it’s largely about family and the values the director drew from that era.
The film at first seems oddly like a tv show from that time as it’s set in 1952 and depicts the family life of pre-teen Sam Fableman. Some of the early scenes are difficult to digest as Sam’s life seems weirdly ideal and everyone, including his doting parents, nerdy computer engineer dad Burt (Paul Dano) and artistically-inclined free-spirit mother Mitzi (Michelle Williams) seem excessively happy. Tension and discord begin to surface though, as his mother appears dissatisfied with life and may be involved with family friend, Benny (Seth Rogen) while Burt buries himself in the burgeoning world of computing. It’s during this time that Sam begins to develop a love for and an unusually therapeutic relationship with film, sometimes using it to deal with trauma such as his attempts to recreate with a home movie camera and toy train set, the train crash sequence from The Greatest Show on Earth that terrified him.
These threads, family, filmmaking and the joyful and bitterly painful experiences of youth, provide the foundation for this at times pedestrian but mostly engrossing rites of passage story. It’s no spoiler to say this is not about Spielberg’s/ Sam’s filmmaking period of the 70’s and beyond but rather the forces that shaped him pre-Hollywood.
At times, The Fabelmans plays more like Woody Allen’s Radio Days than a typical Spielberg film. It’s a reminiscence about a time and about an America before the counter-cultural explosion that pits quirky humour against the backdrop of Sam’s unusual and increasingly dysfunctional home life. There’s also typical but poignant teen drama as Sam is forced to confront anti-Semitic high school bullies and teen romance.
Through all this, Sam finds stability and identity in his nascent filmmaking. As his bedroom turns into an editing studio, he creates backyard westerns and war movies with DIY special effects and his scout troop as cast members and even does a 60’s beach party take on his class’s muck-up day.
It’s through filmmaking that Sam also finds hidden and sometimes disturbing truths about the people in his life. In one sequence he discovers painful secrets about his mother something that propels him into a moral dilemma that shapes much of his life. In another he uses film to reveal what he sees as the true character of his bullies.
Spielberg has often been derided for his sentimentality and a film that, by proxy, explores his family and love of filmmaking would seem ripe for that. Fortunately, he mostly avoids being too saccharine and adopts a matter-of-fact style that makes events more believable if at times a little mundane.
As Sam, Gabriel LaBelle isn’t especially charismatic but that’s not a problem. He’s a likeable average guy trying to navigate a rapidly changing and confusing world via a raw talent and passion for an art form. Michelle Williams is typically excellent as the troubled Mitzi although her character’s heightened emotion and at times unusual behaviours do take a while to acclimatise to. Paul Dano, who was forging a fine career playing creepy weasel characters, seems an odd choice for a cuckolded 1950’s dad and his performance seems oddly stilted. He’s meant to be emotionally repressed and distant but he doesn’t quite deliver the pathos the character needed. Seth Rogen was an excellent casting choice, though, as he underscores his usual loud exuberance and affability with a touch of sleaziness.
Typical of a Spielberg film, The Fabelmans is wonderfully shot and while cinematographer and long-time collaborator Janusz Kaminski’s superb sun-bleached images vividly recall the 60’s, the style isn’t forced and the film isn’t overly art directed.
Spielberg obsessives will no doubt be scouring every frame for references to his future films but apart from a few shots of youngsters riding through the suburbs on BMX’s and possibly the monkey from Raiders, he doesn’t appear to have laid too many crumbs here. Old school movie buffs will rejoice, however, at a sequence in which Sam, in his early 20’s, has the opportunity to meet a filmmaking idol. While being offered a job as an assistant’s assistant on Hogan’s Heroes he’s asked if he would like to meet the greatest living filmmaker. I’ll leave it up to audiences to discover who that is.
The Fabelmans isn’t everything we would want from a Spielberg biopic, even one about a fraction of his life. It’s best then to forget expectations and just imbibe the film for its craftsmanship, its sensitive and thoughtful story of self-discovery and its love of cinema.
Nick’s rating: ***1/2
Genre: Drama/ Comedy/ Biopic/ Rites of Passage
Classification: M/ PG/MA15+.
Director(s): Steven Spielberg.
Release date: 5th Jan 2023.
Running time: 151 mins.
Reviewer: Nick Gardener can be heard on “Built For Speed” every Friday night from 8-10pm on 88.3 Southern FM.