Early Spielberg films felt understated because he didn’t have the budget. Once he started getting the fat cash to make movies with understatement evaporated. Look at Minority Report, that’s the kind of film he always wanted to make, but couldn’t. He’s a kitchen sink guy, the difference between Close Encounters and ET era Spielberg and now is just how many kitchen sinks can he buy.
As an homage to the early Spielberg the movie is pretty good. I love the kids’ zombie movie at the end, like the Romero chemical nod. It’s not a great movie, but it is a fun ride. Which when you really look at Spielberg’s history (and certainly JJ’s) that’s really always been his specialty, yeah sometimes he stumbles on gold but most of the time he spins a decent yarn pretty well and 3 years later you don’t even remember it existed.
His best films are enduring though. Close Encounters and E.T. are great films that stick in the memory over 30 years later. I would add ‘War of the Worlds’ as well which I thought was shamefully underrated. And then there’s Schindler’s List...