I guess I just don’t see the problem. Is it kind of artificial and manipulative? Sure, but so is the over the top nihilistic and gritty movies and shows that dominate our culture these days, often to critical acclaim.They can feel just as blatantly artificial in their attempts to elicit shock and awe. Game of Thrones and The Walking Dead are just extended games of russian roulette, there’s no nuance there, no deeper meaning, no true artistic message. Nobody’s coming away from game of thrones with a new perspective on life and deeper understanding of the human condition. They are simple emotion manipulators, no better than a roller coaster or drop tower. If something’s going to blatantly manipulate me, I’d at least like it to be going for pleasant emotions. Isn’t there enough shock and awe going on in real life right now? Apparently the masses do not agree with me on that one, though.

Movies I like that critics thought were too sentimental:
Christopher Robin
Treasure Planet
Bicentennial Man
La La Land
Dead Poets Society
The Fall

I’ve been a huge fan of Spielberg’s since Jaws and the first Indy film but every now and then he makes a film that initially doesn’t seem to appeal to me usually for the sentimentality factor that oozes through the trailer but when I do get around to seeing it I usually really enjoy it (examples, Empire of the Sun, Color Purple and Always) and War Horse was no different.

Having exhausted every other option at the local video store that week I rented War Horse and to my surprise loved it. The ending piled it on a bit thick but over all I felt Spielberg handled the sentimentality perfectly as he usually does. In fact if anything I’d say it’s one of his specialities – take ET for example.

Unfortunately the trailer editors like to milk every drop of emotion from a film and it ends up appearing over saturated with tear jerking moments but a master like Spielberg knows how to balance those moments and get the most out of them so I won’t let the trailers influence my opinion of his films again.

It is true though that less skilful directors do overuse sentimentality or misuse it in their films and it can have the opposite effect of what is intended but if used correctly I think it’s one of the most powerful tools a director has. If Hitchcock was the master of suspense I think it’s fair to say that Spielberg might be the master of sentimentality (but in a good way

When Bana in Munich, after having killed the murderer of his closest associate, talks to his daughter, who he hasn’t seen since birth, and cries during the conversation, I consider it a very sentimental scene. And a great one one at that too, since it isn’t overtaken by sappy music (this is what made the scene between Caine and Bane at the stairs in The Dark Knight Rises easily the best one in the film, and far superior to both of the actors’ previous scene, which was heavily overshadowed by Zimmer’s score).

I am looking forward to Lincoln, but I’m bringing a box of tissue…

I think it’s just a cop out to blame Spielberg for sentimentality. He’s a director who operates on emotion. He’s old school and comes from a less cynical age when movies where supposed to move you and make you believe in the magic of film.
Nowadays, where even the average movie-goer can tell you how effects are made, where the magic of filmmaking is disseminated and exposed in DVD extras, it’s easier to be cynical about the whole thing. (I love commentaries but I can respect Spielberg for refusing to do them).

The most successful Hollywood directors of the modern age either do not operate on emotion or use it very sparely. Tarantino is a great example. The guy, an amazing director to be sure, made a career on brilliant revisionist cinema, but true emotions, especially tender/positive ones, are rare. And his deepest, most adult film, Jackie Brown, is largely ignored.
Fincher specializes in cold, calculated movies, and when he dared pursue a film that operates on high emotion, the beautifully made Strange Case Of Benjamin Button, he got slammed by his fans for getting “soft”.

So I would say Spielberg will not change at this point. Either you like seeing sunsets with a sweeping John Williams score in the background, or you don’t. As long as emotional filmmaking, even excessive one, is genuine and comes from the heart (i.e, not melodramatic), it’s fine by me. The rest is just a matter of taste.