Lost his mojo like many greats

I just finished watching E.T. after a week of watching Dual, Jaws, Close Encounters Of The Third Kind and Raiders of the Lost Ark for probably each the hundredth time in my life, and still can't get over how incredibly well made they are. But what happened to his Spielbergy mojo?

This seems to be a common pattern in a directors career; and my guess is they accumulate their best work earlier on when, likely, a combination of youthful energy, fresh ideas and greater financial restraints push their motivation and creative passion to a higher degree. It's sad to contemplate this, as Spielberg's definitely one of the greatest directors.

After Schindler's List and Jurassic Park, i can't recall a movie he's done that's pulled at the heart strings, propelled me into a sense of adventure nor made me love and remember his characters. "Saving Private Ryan" has solid performances from a great cast, and a devastating opening scene; but then the film accumulated into hollywood formula that ultimately didn't do anything unique for the war genre. "A.I." is great... flawed in some ways...but arguably underrated - no doubt this was owing to Stanley Kubricks' screenplay. "Minority Report" is also a solid sci-fi follow up that I occasionally still watch and there's other exceptions such as "Catch Me If You Can" I really enjoyed. "Lincoln" I enjoyed - by no means is it a bad film - it's good (Although it would probably help if I understood the American history a bit better.) My point is they're not as distinctive and memorable compared to the string of masterpieces he made throughout the 70s, 80s and early 1990s.

Also John Williams' compositions have similarly suffered in quality, they have their moments still (and still a stand-out among his contemplates at least) but what has he written in the last 20 odd years as memorable as Schindler's List, E.T, Star Wars, Born On The 4th of July, Raiders, etc? I assume they reflect the quality of the films he's assigned to write music for in the first place.

My rant... On the bright side, he's still made at least 7 classic films that have all aged very well. And only one "Hook."