This is the kind of movie that, even today, audiences immediately fall in love with. It has all the right ingredients: a smart script, a likable hero, a dash of romance, more than a touch of comedy, and a lot of fast-paced action. The movie is just plain fun.

Using the overpowering techniques of modern film, Steven Spielberg has cut through the glory-tinged gauze that shrouds World War II to reveal its brutal reality, creating a phenomenology of violence unsurpassed in the history of cinema. A soberly magnificent war masterpiece that is a powerful experience.

Close Encounters' most iconic bits (the theme, the mashed-potato sculpture, etc.) have been so thoroughly absorbed into the culture that it's easy to forget that its treatment of aliens as peaceful beings rather than warmongering monsters was somewhat groundbreaking in 1977.

A masterful work infused with beautiful and haunting visuals, outstanding performances from Tom Cruise and a gifted supporting cast -- and a story that challenges the mind and engages the spirit. Rivals some of Spielberg's top adventure/science fiction epics, such as Close Encounters and Raiders of the Lost Ark.

The excitement of Jurassic Park is in Spielberg's sense of timing, with the scene of the kids trapped in a jeep watching a cup of water tremble now a classic moment of cinema. Jurassic Park earns its spot in fantasy-film history.