Over the past few years, Shia LaBeouf has completely reinvented his career and personal life. After having broke into stardom with big roles in Transformers and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, LaBeouf has since gone on to have a diverse, unpredictable professional life. Not only that, he has recently participated in odd, almost unnatural personal activities, all of which were shared across social media. The actor watched every single one of his movies in succession, all the while recording his reactions as they played. But LaBeouf’s latest move could grind some gears with more people than he thought.
LaBeouf has worked with number of different filmmakers, ranging all the way from Michael Bay to Steven Spielberg. And one of LaBeouf’s most impactful collaborations with Spielberg was on Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, a film that unfortunately went on to poor reception. Despite the negative outlook on the film, LaBeouf never showed anger or aggravation with it or the director. The actor has had some very opinionated thoughts about Hollywood in the past, but he recently spoke to Variety about his time with huge franchises, stating a few unkind comments about Spielberg.
You get there, and you realize you’re not meeting the Spielberg you dream of. You’re meeting a different Spielberg, who is in a different stage in his career. He’s less a director than he is a f–king company.
It’s pretty surprising to hear negative words about Spielberg who has always had a very kind, sensitive public persona. LaBeouf went on to discuss his thoughts about Spielberg’s on-set process, revealing how he felt making a movie with the legendary director.
Spielberg’s sets are very different. Everything has been so meticulously planned. You got to get this line out in 37 seconds. You do that for five years, you start to feel like not knowing what you’re doing for a living.
It will be interesting if Spielberg does reply to LaBeouf’s comments at some point. After Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, LaBeouf hasn’t starred in any franchises, striving for smaller, character-driven films. Spielberg has gone down a similar route, having done everything from period dramas to adventure movies over the last few years. So, LaBeouf’s harsh words probably won’t change too much, although hopefully he won’t continue to reveal other personal thoughts like this that could hurt himself, or others, detrimentally.