I want to agree with him, but money shows he's wrong. People will go see sequels, adaptations, and remakes. Studios will not stop printing money because Spielberg wants to take the high road. Fortunately, studios will keep making Spielberg movies, but up and coming filmmakers won't have his pull.

What Spielberg might want to do is, create a fellowship for creatives, and see if he can get some of his pull applied to their works. He might have to put up some of his own money, like as an investor hoping to make a return. I think that's kind of what a production company (i.e. Amblin Entertainment, here) does, but I'm not 100% sure.

Also, we shouldn't be so quick to forget that Spielberg bought up the rights to Ready Player One so he could change it into an advertisement for his own movies. He did keep the spirit of the movie, and the movie was awesome, but everything was changed to advertise his previous films. The movie still worked — it was a fun homage to the 1980s — but it was never meant to be a showcase of one person's work, it was meant to be a showcase of the 1980s and the culture Ernest Cline grew up in, as a whole.

[–] ltxrtquq@lemmy.ml 12 points 1 week ago

Although Spielberg recognized that his films were a significant part of the 1980s popular culture cited in the book, he opted to remove many references to them to avoid accusations of vanity.[75] Cline believed Spielberg wanted to avoid self-references to films he directed, due to the criticism he received for his film 1941, which lampooned his own previous works Jaws and Duel. Cline said he had to convince Spielberg to include some iconic elements, such as the DeLorean time machine from Back to the Future, which Spielberg conceded as he only produced the film.[76] Spielberg also allowed the Tyrannosaurus rex from Jurassic Park to be included.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ready_Player_One_(film)#Cultural_references

For your last paragraph. What references to old Spielberg movies do you think you remember in Ready Player One?

[–] Honytawk@discuss.tchncs.de 2 points 1 week ago

Yes, people will go see remakes and adaptations (sequels are fine since they are new content). The question is, for how long?

Spielberg knows it isn't going to last.

[–] badelf@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 1 week ago

"People will go see sequels, adaptations, and remakes." These are the same people that vote.