He's made some nice strides since the walkie talkies in 2002.

This is also a good interview from last year: http://www.aintitcool.com/node/49897

Quint: I can’t wait, man. I love that the last DVD release actually had the original mono soundtrack on it as well. I wasn’t a fan of the remixed 5.1 sound… the splashing sounded canned…

Steven Spielberg: Oh, I know. I totally understand that. (In the future) there’s going to be no more digital enhancements or digital additions to anything based on any film I direct. I’m not going to do any corrections digitally to even wires that show.

If 1941 comes on Blu-Ray I’m not going to go back and take the wires out because the Blu-Ray will bring the wires out that are guiding the airplane down Hollywood Blvd. At this point right now I think letting movies exist in the era, with all the flaws and all of the flourishes, is a wonderful way to mark time and mark history.

Quint: I’m in total agreement with you. I wish you could talk George (Lucas) into doing the same thing!

Steven Spielberg: Well, I can’t!

Quint: (laughs) Yeah, I don’t think anybody can!

Steven Spielberg: George goes his own way and I respect him for it, but my new philosophy on this is to let sleeping dogs lie.

Quint: That’s great news for film lovers.

Steven Spielberg: When people ask me which E.T. they should look at, I always tell them to look at the original 1982 E.T. If you notice, when we did put out E.T. we put out two E.T.s. We put out the digitally enhanced version with the additional scenes and for no extra money, in the same package, we put out the original ‘82 version. I always tell people to go back to the ’82 version.

Quint: Having the option is the big deal for me. Using the Star Wars example, I don’t think there’d be an outcry if we could watch a nice transfer of the original versions. We’d be like, “George can do what he wants and I’ll watch it… but you know maybe the fans would like the option of watching the movie they fell in love with, too.”

Steven Spielberg: Yeah. And I think the other good thing is that they understand when they see a movie and they suddenly see something that obviously could have been done much better today and could have been corrected in the DVD/Blu-Ray transfer, they really appreciate seeing the strings attached.

If somebody put out George Pal’s War of the Worlds and took the strings off the machines I’d be very upset. When that machine crashes in downtown Hollywood, and you see the strings going from taut to slack, that’s the thing that allows me to both understand this movie is scaring the hell out of me and at the same time this movie is a creation of the human race.

That little taut-to-slack moment of those wires on that wingtip makes the original George Pal War of the Worlds work for me. It embraces my fears and it also alleviates them in the same breath.

And that is exactly how I have always felt about the SW changes. When I watch a movie I'm just as interested in marveling at the accomplishments in context of when the film was made. I love the matte boxes in SW. It feels like PEOPLE made the movie. Now the films are more machine than man. Twisted and evil.