American Literature C Block Research Paper: Final Draft Steven Spielberg: Revolutionary and Visionary Who would have thought that a brilliant career in filmmaking could have originated with a modest jar of Skippy Peanut Butter smeared on a neighbors window in a tiny Cincinnati suburb? One might not think that such an average boyhood prank could evolve a boy into a man who would become the most financially successful film director in history. Well, that is exactly where Leah Spielberg, Steven Spielbergs mother, would trace her sons initial entry into becoming one of our nations most creative storytellers. His badness was so original, she recalls (Stein 3).Steven Spielberg, the only child of Leah and Arnold Spielberg, was born on December 18, 1946 at the beginning of the Baby Boom years in Cincinnati, Ohio. It does not take a great stretch of the imagination to see that Stevens film influences were derived from his fathers experience as a World War II veteran and computer technician and his mothers past profession as a concert pianist. The love and amount of technology, history, and music within Stevens films can all be traced back to his early life with his family.While many men returning from war never want to reiterate their experiences, Stevens father seemed to be an exception. Steven said of his father, he intoxicated me with bedtime stories about the war. His stories were like the war movies I was watching on television, all worthy of cameo appearances by John Wayne (Stein 1). It is no wonder that at the age of twelve Stevens first film, Fighter Squad, was filmed on a WWII fighter plane (Corliss 79). However, when Steven was unable to find certain props or realistic backdrops, he simulated dogfights and plane crashes by editing in footage from a WWII documentary. Only a year later, in 1960, he featured the war family Jeep in his second film, Escape to Nowhere, which was an action picture in which GIs invaded a Nazi hide...
