Steven Spielberg’s E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial is a cinematic staple that charmed audiences in 1982 and still retains its wonder, brilliance, and popularity to this day. A lot’s been said about this movie, a lot that I really couldn’t summarize, but that I probably don’t need to. E.T. is a success in any way you look at it; the movie is a technical masterpiece, with beautiful and meaningful cinematography, real three-dimensional characters, top-notch performances from Henry Thomas, Peter Coyote, and Drew Barrymore, and an iconic and unforgettable score by John Williams. I really like E.T., and I didn’t used to. I used to think E.T. was a good but ultimately hokey kids’ movie, and when I re-watched I was surprised by the depth and substance in a film about an alien.
E.T. starts strong. It opens eerily and slowly as we enter a forest, obstructed by a heavy fog and the cold blackness of the night. John Williams’ score only enforces and adds to this feeling of ominousness, and it’s quiet and slow and alien. We watch as dark human silhouettes run through the forest, but Spielberg films this from a lower perspective, from the eye-level of E.T.; from the start of the movie, we are forced to empathize with E.T. The silhouettes of government agents are tall and looming, and their faces are obscured by the darkness—they’re dehumanized, and that’s a deliberate decision by Spielberg to make us empathize with E.T. Throughout the majority of the film, we don’t see the faces of the adults, except for Elliott’s mother Mary and a few others towards the end. After we see E.T. escape the government agents, simultaneously getting stranded on Earth, we begin Elliott’s part of the story. Something Spielberg loves to do, and does skillfully, is to show the American household as we are most familiar with it: messy, imperfect, and real. A perfect family in a perfect home can’t strike the emotional resonance that Elliott and his family can, and that’s because they’re depicted realistically. They’re imperfect. Something that impacts the entire family is the loss of their father; he’s not dead, but he and Mary and are separated, and that really affects all of them. Something that really surprised and impressed me is Mike’s character. When we’re introduced to the family, Mike and his friends are playing Dungeons & Dragons. Elliott wants to play, but Mike and his friends don’t want him to. One of Mike’s friends, Steve, tells Elliott to go wait for the pizza, and then he can play. Elliott has his first encounter with E.T. while he’s outside, and he runs inside to tell the older boys and his mother, Mary. They don’t believe him, and you can tell they don’t really respect him either, or at least not much. Not even Elliott’s mother believes him, and the next day at breakfast Mike teases Elliott over this “goblin”. Elliott gets angry at yells at him (calling him “penis breath”), and Mary tells him to sit down. Elliott says, almost to himself, “Dad would believe me.” Mary suggests he call his dad and tell him about it. Elliott says “I can't. He's in Mexico with Sally.” This is obviously a sore subject, and Elliott said it to hit a nerve. Mary gets up and leaves to the kitchen, hurt. Mike quietly tells Elliott he’s going to kill him. You can tell that Mike isn’t just a mean older brother archetype; he’s a real character. He cares about his mother. He’s three-dimensional, and throughout the movie he makes a transition into a firm protagonist. These refreshing changes and nuances are what keeps E.T. fresh and resonant after 35 years. Another part of E.T that really stuck out to me is the way it shows loss. This movie is about a lot of different things, but it is definitely about loss. Elliott and his family have lost their father, and they all miss him. After Elliott makes that remark about his father at breakfast, Mary is visibly upset by it. Elliott and Mike share a moment in the shed later where they each smell their father’s shirt, which still smells of his Old Spice cologne. Elliot and his family lose E.T. twice, first when he (spoilers) dies, and second when he leaves Earth and returns to his home (after being revived). What really struck me, and what prompted me to write this, is how E.T. handles and portrays loss. The scenes where E.T. and Elliott are in the medical room, both near death, are particularly painful. The doctors talking over each other frantically, the confusion and chaos and helplessness we and Elliott feel, and this overwhelming sadness—it’s all harshly real. Or at least it was to me. I think this comes from a personal place within Spielberg, as much of this movie does. I think he was trying to convey a lot of the feelings he felt in his childhood here, feelings both good and bad. And I think that personal touch really adds something to this film, an element that is able to make us easily relate to the relatable characters, and to put ourselves in their shoes and their situations, situations that we’ve been in, too. The reason I wanted to write about E.T. is because of loss, and because of the way the movie portrays such a lonely feeling in such a realistic way. There are a lot of ways to feel loss; maybe you lost someone emotionally, maybe you feel betrayed and distant and alone, like Mary. Maybe you lost someone who passed away, and you feel overwhelming sadness and heartache, like the entire family did to E.T.’s death. Maybe you lost someone because you both had to go separate ways, and it’s a bittersweet, albeit inevitable, loss. Maybe you haven’t felt any of that, and that’s okay, because that isn’t the point. The point is, E.T. was able to display emotions and feelings in a very nuanced way that a lot of movies shy away from. Studios think that people don’t want to see that, because it’s too specific to be relatable. But the truth is, when you give yourself to a film like Spielberg did, and you open yourself up and spill yourself out, people will be drawn to that realism. People know what feels real, and they appreciate it when they see it. For a movie revolving around an alien, E.T. feels surprisingly human.
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