Will Liam Neeson Free Steven Spielberg from a Career Slump for a 2nd Time?
In the early spring of 1983 one of the greatest crimes in Academy Award history was committed when the bloated and immensely overrated film biopic Gandhi won the Oscar for Best Picture over Steven Spielberg’s infinitely superior and atrociously misunderstood E.T: The Extra-Terrestrial. While generally viewed from the perspective of a simple family movie not unlike a Lassie film, E.T. is actually a very dark film that has levels of meaning and significance that Richard Attenborough’s surface interpretation of the leader of the push for India’s independence could only hope to have. Despite the loss, there was little doubt as to who the future of filmmaking belonged to. It was understood that Steven Spielberg would almost certainly win an Oscar before the 1980s was done; he was on one of the hottest streaks in Hollywood history. And yet, except for the uneven reception given to his interpretation of The Color Purple, the last half of the 1980s represents the least interesting period of Sp
