Film-maker pledges more movie magic
‘‘The science-fiction thriller Ready Player One, about a virtual online world in 2044, is expected to be completed in 2018.’’
A great white shark swims menacingly through the water, an alien extends his gnarled, glowing finger and soldiers in World War II endure unimaginable slaughter.
Director Steven Spielberg has created unforgettable moments in film.
He and Harrison Ford are collaborating on the fifth Indiana Jones movie, and when it’s released in 2019, both will be septuagenarians. Spielberg tuned 70 on Sunday, joining Ford in a group in which many people are retired.
But neither of the greying Hollywood titans is the least bit tired of film-making.
Spielberg, a two-time winner of the Best Director Oscar, said in May at the Cannes Film Festival in France that he plans to make movies until the day he dies.
Aside from the Indiana Jones movie, Spielberg has several others in the works.
Due out at the end of next year is The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara, a historical drama based on a true story of the far-reaching implications of the 1858 abduction of an Italian Jewish boy.
The science-fiction thriller Ready Player One, about a virtual online world in 2044, is expected to be completed in 2018.
The movies Spielberg has directed, from his breakthrough Jaws in 1975 to the recent film The BFG, have made him one of the most successful directors in history.
Among his biggest films are the heart-warming E.T. the Extraterrestrial (1982), the gripping World War II dramas Schindler’s List (1993) and Saving Private Ryan (1998), Lincoln (2012) and Bridge of Spies (2015).
His love of the movies began early in life, making his first amateur film at age 12 on 8-millimetre film.
Spielberg directed his first movie, The Sugarland Express starring Goldie Hawn, in 1974 and at age 28, he gave Hollywood a jolt with Jaws, which ushered in the era of blockbuster films.
Spielberg had to wait several years for one of the coveted statues, finally scoring a win when Schindler’s List won seven Academy Awards, including the Best Director and Best Picture awards. The movie also won three Golden Globes.
He said the movie, filmed in part in front of the gates of the Auschwitz concentration camp, changed his life. It prompted him to conduct research into his own Jewish relatives who were killed in the Holocaust.
Soon after Schindler’s List, Spielberg founded the Shoah Foundation, which is dedicated to making audio and video recordings of people who survived or witnessed the Holocaust.
Spielberg received his second Best Director Oscar in 1999 for Saving Private Ryan.
His films have often been based on historical and political material, such as the Olympic massacre at the 1972 summer games in Munich, the Amistad slave revolt and the exchange of Cold War spies.