The Failure of 'The Fabelmans'

The Fabelmans, Steven Spielberg’s fictionalized autobiography, is up for seven Oscars this year. The nominations include best picture and best director for Spielberg, who has won that award twice before. He might well win it again for The Fabelmans, an achingly tender portrayal of young Sammy Fabelman’s self-realization as a filmmaker. But Spielberg, the real-life Sammy, fails in his central effort to excuse his mother for abandoning her husband and breaking up their family of six.