[12][13] In 1952, in Haddon Township, New Jersey, Jewish couple Mitzi and Burt Fabelman take their young son Sammy to see his first film: The Greatest Show on Earth.

While having dinner with the Fabelmans, she suggests that Sammy film their Ditch Day at the beach, something he accepts after Monica mentions that her father owns a 16 mm Arriflex camera that he would let him use.

"[31] In May 2021, after a three-month search and over 2,000 contenders, Gabriel LaBelle entered final negotiations to portray the lead role, Sammy Fabelman, a young aspiring filmmaker based on Spielberg himself.

[34] In July, Chloe East, Oakes Fegley, Isabelle Kusman, Jeannie Berlin, Judd Hirsch, Robin Bartlett and Jonathan Hadary were added to the cast.

[18] According to an interview she did for the Hollywood Insider at the TIFF premiere, Julia Butters was gifted with Anne Spielberg's high school ring to wear while she played Reggie Fabelman.

[60] To recreate the three houses that Spielberg lived in during his childhood in Haddon Township, New Jersey, Phoenix, Arizona, and Saratoga, California, production designer Rick Carter worked off floor plans that the director sketched from memory and then took artistic license with the spaces to fit the emotional mindset of Sammy.

Kole Lyndon Lee of ScreenCraft analyzed how these themes were used in some of Spielberg's other films to relate to how Sammy used his filmmaking "to cope with his personal reality and trauma" in the midst of his struggles at home and at school.

Serena Irani of The Michigan Daily and David Sims of The Atlantic interpreted Sammy's emotional reaction in this scene as "transfixed as he is horrified by the notion, and perhaps the inevitable knowledge that he will one day make this film," relating it to how the divorce of Spielberg's parents in real life had a large impact on his work.

[79][80] Kayla Laguerre-Lewis of Screen Rant called the scene the one that drives home why Spielberg's films connect personally to his past, specifically his parents' divorce, comparing it to how the theme was handled in E.T.

[2][83][84] On the announcement of the premiere, TIFF CEO Cameron Bailey remarked: "It's different from a typical Spielberg blockbuster, but it is just as easily impactful in terms of the emotional effect it's going to have on people.

the Extra-Terrestrial (1982), Jaws (1975), Munich (2005), Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) and Schindler's List (1993) were also screened) and at the awards ceremony, where Spielberg received an honorary Golden Bear for lifetime achievement.

[115] The film expanded alongside Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery, Strange World, Devotion, and the wide expansion of Bones and All, and was projected to gross around $3–5 million from 638 theaters over the five-day weekend.

This was attributed to the general public's trending lack of interest in prestige films, a muted reception from older audience demographics and the large decline in popularity and relevance of Spielberg and his filmography.

"[131] Peter Debruge of Variety named it the frontrunner for the Academy Award for Best Picture, while writing "...this endearing, broadly appealing account of how Spielberg was smitten by the medium – and why the prodigy nearly abandoned picture-making before his career even started – holds the keys to so much of the master's filmography.

"[133] Brian Tallerico of RogerEbert.com praised the screenplay, calling it "...a graceful gem, moving through different chapters of the life of this relatively average family that would just happen to produce an unaverage filmmaker.

"[134] Benjamin Lee of The Guardian was mixed, saying that "There remains a remove though still, Spielberg giving us a slightly too stage-managed version of himself and his family, some gristle missing from the darkest moments.

"[135] Tomris Laffly of The Playlist wrote "It's Spielberg's most personal film, one that gorgeously revives the memories of his childhood and youth with a lavish sense of wistfulness and an aptly Hollywood-ized, fable-like touch.

"[136] John DeFore of The Hollywood Reporter called it "...a vivid capturing of the auteur's earliest flashes of filmmaking insight and a portrait, full of love yet unclouded by nostalgia, of the family that made him.

"[137] Justin Chang of Los Angeles Times called it "A uniquely confessional work, in which a great artist freely and happily acknowledges the manipulation inherent in the art form he was born to master.

"[138] Leah Greenblatt of Entertainment Weekly wrote that "If it all feels a little sanitized and idealized, it's also consistently lovely – and after 75 years and 34 films, who more than Spielberg has earned the right to revisit his stardust memories?

"[142] Anthony Lane of The New Yorker praised the film, saying "'The Fabelmans' may look nice 'n' easy as it swings along, with a pile of laughs to cushion the ride, and a nifty visual gag in the closing seconds, but take care.

"[29] In a later review for the paper, Manohla Dargis named it a New York Times Critic's Pick, calling the film "...somewhat of a fable and wonderful in both large and small ways, even if Spielberg can't help but soften the rougher, potentially lacerating edges.

"[145] Alison Willmore of Vulture wrote that "Spielberg, an incredibly precise filmmaker, never seems certain as to what a movie about his life, or about that of a slightly outsize proxy, should look like, and that uncertainty is actually the warmest and most vulnerable quality The Fabelmans has.

"[146] Johnny Oleksinski of New York Post praised the film, calling it "...gripping, visually mesmeric, boasts an exceptional, grounded script by Tony Kushner and is acted to the hilt.

Club praised the film, calling it "A measured and incredibly intimate look at Spielberg's upbringing as he developed his aptitude for storytelling through a medium that mesmerized him... as an extraordinary device that not only unveils powerful truths, but often shapes them as well.

"[148] David Sims of The Atlantic singled out LaBelle, Williams and Dano's performances and praised Spielberg's use of storytelling, saying that "Viewers expecting a stirring childhood memoir about the power of cinema may be surprised at how bittersweet and raw the story actually is.

[150] Zacharek would furthermore praise Williams and Dano's performances as part of Time's Top 10 movie performances of 2022, describing Williams as "a portrait of a woman so full of life she doesn't know where to put it all…Williams captures Mitzi's all-encompassing incandescence and her isolation," and Dano "In him we see the sum of all the things that so many men of that generation just didn't know how to be; we also see a deep well of love, no less real for being left unexpressed.

[154][155] Adam Nayman of The Ringer named the frame of younger Sammy Fabelman (Mateo Zoryan Francis-DeFord) "projecting his own painstakingly captured Super 8 footage onto his outstretched palms" in the dark as one of the best shots of 2022, calling it "...a holy trinity that, as visualized by Steven Spielberg at his late-career image-making peak, signifies something deeply metaphysical about filmgoing and filmmaking — that the artist must imagine himself amidst the audience.

"[158][159] The scene itself would also go viral on social media during the first week of the film's VOD release in December 2022, with users praising LaBelle's line delivery and resulting in the character of Sammy becoming popular through fancams uploaded to Twitter and TikTok.

[175] In 2023, Collider ranked the film as the "Best Drama Movie of the 2020s, So Far", writing that Spielberg put "into beautiful words and images the issues that he's been struggling with for his entire life; he's desperately trying to piece together a broken family while pursuing his addiction to telling stories.