DallasFrance’s review published on Letterboxd:
The Fabelmans was good, but it just felt so… written. In a scene right after Sammy’s parents tell the kids they’re getting a divorce, his sister Natalie exclaims through tears that “Benny always laughed at [their mother’s] jokes, but Dad was always her best audience!” It didn’t sound at all like a fifteen-year-old. It sounded like a seventy-year-old man making absolutely sure that he communicated a very specific point to his audience, even if it sounded reeeeaaally stilted coming out of the actor’s mouth.
A bit later in the film, Sammy’s mother Mitzi pleads with her son to try to understand why she needed to get the divorce. The scene might stand out to me because Michelle Williams is one of the best actors in the world, and so often delivers raw performances with dialogue written by filmmakers like Kelly Reichardt and Kenneth Lonergan. Again, in as emotional a scene as any in the film, Spielberg’s dialogue smooths out the raw edges and covers up the bruises Williams is so great at revealing in her characters.
It’s a Spielberg film, so of course there’s also plenty to praise. Gabriel LaBelle is solid as teenage Sammy, and Isabelle Kushan, who plays his Jesus-loving high school girlfriend, brings a jolt of energy and fun in limited screen time. I enjoyed watching Sammy running everywhere with his camera, doing everything from making westerns to filming Senior Cut Day. Spielberg’s emotional connection to his work hit hard, but his emotional connection to people kept falling out of the frame for me.
