Most Overrated Spielberg prior to Saving Private Ryan

Rating: 2/10 (29 August 2005)

At least ET didn't trash the wonderful veterans of World War II and the D Day Invasion like Private Ryan did; no, it's a harmless little movie. In retrospect, way too smug in the aliens-are-OK insider stance with Peter Coyote and... and, well just quite a few alien lovers in the film. I rate it 2 rather than 1 for the breakfast scene with a still young Drew Barrymore and her "alligators in the sewers" line; but this film, like the filmmaker Spielberg, has no real character or backbone. Family Classics, true classics, have one thing in common: They remain classics year-after-year. Like Wizard of Oz, still new after 66 years. Poor E.T. has no resilient value either at the box office or on television. Poor old Sears bought the TV rights for several years of annual runs. Trouble was, nobody much watched. Now Sears doesn't bother exercising their right-to-play anymore. This film did, however, make big dollars in its initial run. As always, the All Time Hit list failed to reflect constant dollar figures, thus squeezing out the true all-time hit SNOW WHITE, which cost 20c to see --- made at a time when $800 was a really good annual income.