Cinema Du Spielberg

So I was watching War of the wolds the other day, the Steven Spielberg movie, and I was thinking how I'm not too thrilled with the way his movies have looked lately, so I did a little research on IMDB.
Here's a small, not at all complete, look at some of his cinematographers.
What I found interesting was that some people he only worked with once (Mikael Solomon) and others repeatedly.

-Bill Butler (Jaws)
-Vilmos Zsigmond (Close Encounters of the Third Kind)
-William A. Fraker (1941)
-Dean Cundey( Jurassic Park, Hook)
-Allen Daviau ( E.T., The Color Purple)
-Douglas Slocombe ( Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) (India sequence)
-Mikael Solomon (Always)
-Janusz Kaminski (shot everything Spielberg has done since Lost World: Jurassic Park 2)

So Janusz Kaminski is his current collaborator of choice, but like I said, I'm not too thrilled with the way his movies have looked lately.
The one that stands out in my head as being different, or more similar to previous Spielburg "looks" is A.I. but only in parts, and as a movie, overall, to use a colloquial term, "Sucked".
I haven't see Munich yet, froom the brief shots I have seen in th commercials, it seems to have a more traditional film look.
My thought is, and this is my taste as a film viewer, that the "distressed" film look can be over done, and I think he has done just that.  It worked, and was appropriate in Saving Private Ryan, and even to a degree Minority Report, althought I think it was overdone in that case.  The milky white, washed out blue tinged look can be a bit much for a whole movie. 
So, I really wanted to point out some of his collaborators, and that was the reason I made the above list.  Douglas Slocombe, amazing, love the films he's done for Spielberg, and apparently so did he, his last film was "Last Crusade" and then he hung it up.  Good place to stop if you ask me... (Steven, Harrison, George, "good place to stop" get it. I am perfectly happy with Last Crusade being the last Indiana Jones adventure, hello, the rode off into the sunset, done, fini! Don't get me started on the whole Hollywood has run out of ideas thing!)

I also liked Mikael Solomon's work on Always very much, it wasn't his most succesful movie, but it's a sappy love story with adventure elements, catch me in the right mood, and I'll tell you this is a "great" movie, it's not, but sometimes, I'm sappy too.  It does "look great" though, and that is Mikael Solomon all over.
He also did The Abyss, Backdraft, and Arachnophobia.  Then sadly, like Barry Sonnenfeld, they (the imfamous "they"), decided to offer him a directors gig, and his D.P. skills would never be seen again. 

Sidebar: Barry Sonnenfeld, Director of Photography on the following movies...
Blood Simple, Raising Arizona, Three O'Clock High, Throw Momma from the Train, Big, When Harry Met Sally..., Miller's Crossing, Misery.
Some of these movies while okay, were made much better by Sonnenfelds hand.  Some of the scenes of When Harry Met Sally in the park are just beautiful, same with Big.  Some of the hyper camera moves polished in the Coen brothers movies make it into "Throw Momma" and it's a better movie for it.

Anyway, my point, and damnitt, I have one, if you'll sit still long enough to let me get to it, is I think that the Directors of Photography sometimes deserve more credit for the success of a movie than the director might like.  And adding to that point, I think D.P.s should be listed in a more prominent place in the credits on IMDB, if for no other reason that to make compiling lists for rants like this one easier.  they should be listed after writer, and director, not burried on the second page, halfway down!

Anyway.  Barry Sonnenfeld, and Mikael Solomon should give up the director gigs, and go back to being D.P.s, oh yeah, and so should Jan De Bont!