Sentimental direction spoils Ballard's surreal masterpiece

Rating: 5/10 (1 March 2018)

I watched this film when it came out as a child and enjoyed it. However, it doesn't stand up to rewatching in the 21st century due to the level of mawkish sentimentality - just how many times can Spielberg fall back on that cringe-inducing "character-slowly-salutes-another-character" device in one film? I think it happens FIVE times in this movie. It is perhaps the laziest and most nauseating device (at least to non-American audiences), and to use it so repeatedly in one film is unbelievable.
Bale was undoubtedly a precocious talent but you can almost see the direction here, as if you can hear in EVERY scene Spielberg's voice "Ok, now look around the room in wonder, now take a step forward, now put out your arms, now turn around". It all seems so hilariously wooden, at one point I thought a chair and table were doing the best acting in the room.
The character of Jim, watched as an adult, is also so unbelievably irritating that in moments when we are supposed to be feeling tension and hoping he doesn't get caught, I was actually hoping that he get swiftly bayoneted so hat the whole tedious film could be over.