Mark Richardson muses about memory, personal history and YouTube. Specifically, he uncovered a storied 1970 Steel Mill gig (with Bruce Springsteen on guitar, audio only) that his wife's uncle MC'ed. And then the 15-year old Boss' garage band, The Castiles. And verified dim memories of seeing Andy Warhol, Bianca Jagger and Steven Spielberg discuss radios in your teeth on TV, and John Cale on a TV game show. And an old Highland Appliances TV ad. That kind of thing.
posted by msalt on Jun 10, 2009 - 10 comments

Twenty-five years later, the main cast of The Goonies reunite for Empire Magazine.
posted by Rhomboid on May 8, 2009 - 84 comments

The "Raiders" Story Conference In 1978 George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, and Lawrence Kasdan spent five consecutive nine-hour days hashing out the characters and plot for Raiders of the Lost Ark. The 125-page transcript of their meetings, unreleased before now, details their insane talent and techniques for populist storytelling. (It also makes one wonder what happened to George Lucas, a man who once had a math formula for exciting cinema.) via Ain't It Cool News, unfortunately
posted by incomple on Mar 10, 2009 - 135 comments

Uh ohhh! McCloud is in trouble! Duel (1971) was Steven Spielberg's very first film, starring Dennis Weaver. If you haven't seen it before and were looking for inspiration to avoid dirt-encrusted, flammable trucks on the road, well here you go.
posted by miss lynnster on Aug 22, 2007 - 59 comments

Who Delayed Roger Rabbit? Rich Drees lays bare the backroom bickering and production studio drama behind one of the 1980s' most successful comedies. For an encore, Drees reviews the unproduced script of Roger Rabbit II: Toon Platoon. Weep for what might have been.
posted by Faint of Butt on Mar 8, 2007 - 52 comments

The Israeli Response to the 1972 Munich Olympic Massacre and the Development of Independent Covert Action Teams is a very interesting 1995 military paper for background and analysis of the Israeli response to the slaughter of Jewish Olympians in 1972. This hot topic is at issue in Spielberg's controversial new film Munich. The film is based on a book by journalist George Jonas and a self-proclaimed Mossad agent, Yuval Aviv. The book also served as the basis for the 1986 movie Sword of Gideon.
posted by dios on Dec 27, 2005 - 58 comments

The making of a D-Day tradition... I immediately get goosebumps when I hear the score of Band of Brothers...I'm not sure why, maybe it was my local connections (Dick Winters, Bill Guanere, Albert Blithe, Babe Heffron, Thomas Meehan, Ralph Spina, Harry Welsh, and Robert Strayer are all from Philadelphia), the surrounding suburbs, or Pennsylvania), or maybe it was because the original airings took place in the shadow of 9/11 (the premiere was September 9th, 2001, with the D-Day drop occuring in the second episode, Day of Days, on 9/16/2001), but this series will ALWAYS have a special place in my heart. Everything is done so beautifully, from the special effects, to the sound, the music, to the dutiful translation from Stephen Ambrose book to the screen. It's certainly worthy of the 9.5 out of 10 that IMDB readers had given it. Every year now since, either HBO (On Demand - you have to subscribe to HBO plus have digital cable) or the History Channel has played Tom Hanks' and Steven Spielberg's masterful WW2 epic. You can think of it as Saving Private Ryan, but 3 times as long. Even if war movies are not your thing, I can almost guarantee that they will see the human side of the soldier and becomely deeply invested in the characters. Follow the men of Easy Company from training and the running of Currahee, to the parachute jump on D-Day, through the liberation of Europe, the horror of a German concentration camp, and eventually to the end of the war, to Hitler's mountaintop retreat. I'm not the only one - check out the numerous fan sites to BoB (forum shorthand for Band of Brothers) here, here, and here, as well as entries on TVTome, Wikipedia, and Television without Pity. If you want to try before you commit to watching the whole thing, I'd recommend the episodes Day of Days, Crossroads, and the Breaking Point.
posted by rzklkng on Jun 4, 2005 - 24 comments

The industry-standard effects magazine Cinefex has made some articles from their archives viewable online. One of them is this lengthy and fascinating look at E.T. from a 1983 issues.
posted by GriffX on Jul 2, 2002 - 9 comments

Indiana Jones and the Geriatric Star Spielberg and Ford confirm it to Fox News -- Indy will don his fedora again after Spielberg's next project. The film has a title and a script (they're mum on both). Can Harrison Ford be a believable hero at his age? He looked winded in Air Force One a few years ago...
posted by krewson on Jan 22, 2002 - 42 comments

A.I.'s chatbot from the movie's website is pretty nifty, even if it doesn't know David or recognize any other obvious questions about the movie.
posted by Zebulun on Jul 11, 2001 - 41 comments

Not-So-Deep-Blue! Why wait for Spielberg's AI. Play 20 Questions with a computer now. (Click on Play 20Q, then Anonymous Login if you prefer not to register).
posted by geronimo_rex on Jun 8, 2001 - 4 comments

As noted earlier this month, there are slew of websites connected to Spielberg’s AI. As it turns out, they are all part of an intricate game that stands to last long after the movie comes out. That game is called “movie marketing,” albiet terribly engrossing marketing.
posted by capt.crackpipe on Apr 30, 2001 - 7 comments

A.I. is already into advertising. BELLADERMA-SRL-IT.COM, INOURIMAGE.ORG, METROPOLITANLIVINGHOMES.COM, DONU-TECH.COM, ROGUERETRIEVAL.COM, SPCB.ORG, ELECTRIC-TOYLAND.COM, KATENEI.COM, FAMILYCHAN.ORG, MARTINSWINTONDESIGNS.COM, RATIONAL-HATTER.COM, UNITE-AND-RESIST.ORG, JEANINESALLA.COM, MARTINSWINTON.COM, CORONERSWEB.ORG, TREACLE-WELL.NET, ONE-LUMP-OR-TWO.NET, OFFWITHHISHEAD.NET, ALEPH-NAUGHT.ORG, ELIZAS-TEAROOM.NET, RAVEN-LIKE-WRITING-DESK.NET, www.bangaloreworldu-in.co.nz are all part of the a.i. website.

more inside...
posted by tiaka on Apr 11, 2001 - 13 comments

In other news - Spielberg hijacks project (A.I.) from Kubrick's grave, hacks it and Casts Robin Williams....
Williams? Williams? I'm going to go out and kill SS myself.
posted by tiaka on Aug 18, 2000 - 11 comments

A fresh shine on Spielberg's well-kissed ass.
posted by highindustrial on Jul 28, 2000 - 11 comments