20. Opening The Ark – “Raiders Of The Lost Ark” (1981)
Part of the genius of “Raiders Of The Lost Ark” is that it doesn’t just recreate the old serials, but it brings other material into the mix too: pulp novels, James Bond, the paranormal — and at the very end, a touch of EC horror Comics, as the Nazis open the ark unleashing the supernatural forces inside, which then proceed to make them melt, explode and burst into flame. It shouldn’t work — it’s a literal deus ex machina — and yet because of the careful work of Lawrence Kasdan’s screenplay, which sees Indy as the eternal skeptic forced into believing for once, it works.
19. The Final Chase – “Duel” (1971)
Technically made for TV but released in theaters in Europe and elsewhere, “Duel” has a purity that more first-time directors should aim for: man pisses off truck driver, truck driver decides to remorselessly and relentlessly chase him, that’s about it. And yet it’s utterly gripping throughout, thanks mostly to Spielberg’s assuredness and control. It’s hard to pick out one moment from another, but the existential intensity of the final stages of the chase are what still stand out for us today.
18. “He Who Saves One Life…” – “Schindler’s List” (1993)
After the horrors of “Schindler’s List,” easily Spielberg’s least sentimental and most horrifying film, you could excuse the director for wanting to let a little light in at the end. But the end of “Schindler’s List” feels utterly earned, as Oskar Schindler (Liam Neeson, in easily his greatest performance) is bade farewell by his workers, who gift him a ring with a quote from the Talmud — “he who saves one life, saves the world entire.” It’s enormously moving stuff, but Spielberg also cannily keeps complications in, with Neeson weeping and wondering if he might have done more, and saved more lives. It’s a magnificent piece of acting, enough to make us wish we had seen Neeson and Spielberg reteam for “Lincoln.”
17. First Sight Of The Dinosaurs – “Jurassic Park” (1993)
Modern blockbusters have plenty of spectacle, and people might call them ‘awesome,’ but there’s very little actual awe in them these days. It’s something that Spielberg’s always been great at, and the opening scenes of “Jurassic Park” are one of the purest examples of that. Spielberg keeps the reveal until quite some way into the film, amusingly letting the characters become bored and disappointed. And then, suddenly, they spot a giant brachiosaurus, as John Williams’ indelible theme kicks in. The effects hold up today, but it’s Sam Neill’s boyish excitement that really sells it as a moment of real wonder.
16. The Opening Death – “Jaws” (1975)
It would be much parodied over time, and copied by even more (current sleeper hit “The Shallows” is basically a feature-length version of the scene), but the opening scene of “Jaws” still finds a level of sheer terror that too few movies actually pull off. Shot with minimal light (DP Bill Butler is a magician), it sees skinny dipper Chrissie (Susan Backlinie) go for a midnight swim, only to be attacked by an unseen, underwater menace, accompanied by John Williams’ two-tone score and the occasional POV shot. More than anything else in the film, it’s this scene that induces the nightmares.
15. Anything Goes – “Indiana Jones & The Temple Of Doom” (1984)
All told, I’m not really a fan of “Temple Of Doom,” which is shrill and sour and grim in a way that its predecessor never was. But it does have an absolute triumph to open it at least. Spielberg’s still never directed a musical, but he got to indulge his Busby Berkeley fantasies with an immaculate Cantonese-language version of Cole Porter’s “Anything Goes” (performed by the future Mrs. Spielberg, Kate Capshaw), one that soon drops a white-tuxed Indy into the middle of a beautifully choreographed brawl.
14. The Outhouse – “Schindler’s List” (1993)
One of the points where “Schindler’s List” stops feeling like constructed drama and starts feeling closer to documentary (the film is still stylistically so strikingly different from every other one of the director’s other films, in many ways much more European), this sees a young boy fleeing Nazi transportation searching for a hiding place, ending up crawling inside a latrine, up to his waist in, well, waste. Spielberg’s facility for showing the world through the eyes of a child comes into play here, but there’s no cutesiness to it, just desperation.
13. Chasing The Falcon – “The Adventures Of Tintin” (2011)
Perhaps thrown by its animated, performance-capture style, a huge break for Spielberg, “The Adventures Of Tintin” still isn’t loved by as many people as it should be, but even the unenlightened have to appreciate the scene where our heroes (Jamie Bell and Andy Serkis) chase a trio of scrolls held by villain Sakharine (Daniel Craig) through (and I mean through) a Moroccan port town. Constructed with the ingenuity of a Looney Tunes cartoon designed by Rube Goldberg, it has more invention, excitement and joy in its five minutes than in an entire summer worth of blockbusters.
12. The Dead Plant – “E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial” (1982)
In the era of the never-ending franchise, a resurrection is ten-a-penny. So it’s not so much that the title character comes back to life in “E.T” that makes it memorable (though Henry Thomas’ ability to milk tear ducts from you certainly isn’t a problem), it’s the way that Spielberg shows it happening, with a resigned Elliot saying his goodbye only to notice that the dead plant that E.T. previously resurrected has just sprung back to life. His scream of joy exactly mirrors that given by the audience at the same time.
11. The Mothership Arrives – “Close Encounters Of The Third Kind” (1977)
Perhaps only a film made in the late 1970s could have turned its depiction of first contact between humanity and an alien culture into a sort of prog-rock light-show. But that’ s what the grand finale of “Close Encounters Of The Third Kind” turns out to be, essentially, and who doesn’t want to return to a time when your massive studio movie could end like that? It’s the centerpiece of an utterly gorgeous sequence that takes up most of the film’s third act, and one that feels not just awe-inspiring, but strangely profound as well.