Image by WikiImages from Pixabay Several times now, I have written about all kinds of war movies. I’ve talked about pro-war films like Glory and Black Hawk Down, and anti-war films such as Paths of Glory and Born on the Fourth of July. I’ve dissected the war epic by examining films like Spartacus and Braveheart. And plenty other personal favorites, from Good Morning, Vietnam to The Pianist. There are so many great war movies, as these past blogs prove.
But, if I were to ask you “What is the definitive war movie?” what would your answer be? Perhaps not everyone would agree. However, I contend that there is only one film that most people would agree lives up to such a designation. And it is none other than Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan. Without question, this World War II epic remains arguably the pinnacle of the war movie genre nearly twenty-five years to the day since it was released. Why? I guess you’ll have to keep reading to find out… 😉 [NOTE: This blog contains spoilers for “Saving Private Ryan.” You have been warned.] The Good Not all war movies look to actual specific events for inspiration, and the ones that do aren’t always effective at pulling off graceful tellings of true stories. However, Saving Private Ryan is undoubtedly an exception to this generalization. It uses the incredible experiences of actual people expertly in crafting a compelling narrative fitting to its World War II setting. For the unfamiliar, screenwriter Robert Rodat (Fly Away Home, The Patriot) was inspired by a family mentioned in historian Stephen Ambrose’s book on D-Day. The Nilands (the family in question) sent four sons to war and only two came back (even though, at the time, three were thought to have died and the War Department dispatched a team to retrieve the youngest—Frederick William “Fritz” Niland—and bring him home). It’s stories like this that deserve the cinematic treatment, and Rodat working with Spielberg made for a fantastic duo to ground this story in the horrifying realities of war while simultaneously constructing an engaging narrative. Which gets to another good thing about Saving Private Ryan: the pacing. Simply put, for a movie that’s nearly three hours long never really feels plodding or laborious in its runtime. With the exception of the dialogue-heavy, quiet scene in the church, the film keeps things moving without ever inorganically rushing the narrative. In other words, all the meaningful beats of the story (i.e. the iconic opening D-Day scene, the characters finding the “fake Ryan” and the real Private Ryan, the climactic battle at Ramelle) flow perfectly from one to the next. For a movie this long, few filmmakers can ensure the audience is constantly engaged with the story and fixated on the characters. Of course, this speaks to the talent and craft of Spielberg’s creative team on display here. The Great In my humble opinion, any great war flick is one where the audience not only likes the characters in danger during battle but is invested in them living or dying. Not just them as fellow human beings, but those specific characters. And, to be honest, it’s difficult for me to think of another war film with as strong of an ensemble cast that invests its audience in their personal journeys than Saving Private Ryan. First, the supporting players that all excel in their respective roles as part of Company C, 2nd Rangers Battalion. Our first casualty is Adrian Caparzo (Vin Diesel), who sees the least amount of screentime from our eight-member ensemble due to being shot and killed by a German sniper in the first act. Despite his relative lack of screentime, Diesel does a great job as the “likeable asshole” who busts the chops of the Company’s newest addition, the interpreter and typist Timothy Upham (Jeremy Davies), before reminding the audience of what’s at stake when he is killed while trying to take a scared, endangered French girl. Next, we have combat medic Irwin Wade (Giovanni Ribisi) whose important role among the group needs no explanation. As a medic, he does all he can to help the wounded wherever he goes whenever he can. Thus, the fact that he is the second man of Company C killed in action (and forty minutes after Caparzo’s death) manages to hit even harder. Not only have our ensemble lost the one person who can save their lives going forward, but together with Diesel their deaths help to immediately develop the tense atmosphere between Company C and their target, Private James Francis Ryan (Matt Damon), within minutes of meeting. Our other two supporting players in Company C? Caparzo’s best friend Stanley “Fish” Mellish (Adam Goldberg) and first-class sniper Daniel Jackson (Barry Pepper). In their own ways, they add a charm mixed with grit to the group dynamic. On the one hand, Mellish’s Jewish heritage gives him particular stake in the war against the Nazis (and a poignantly emotional scene to cap off the iconic opening battle scene in Normandy). Conversely, Jackson remains something of a rock amongst the group as a reliable killer willing to risk his life to save his comrades. What is perhaps most memorable, however, about both Mellish and Jackson is the manner of their deaths which I find ironic considering how polar-opposite they are from one another. Despite doing his damnedest sniping from the bell tower, Jackson is unable to face down a tank which brings his end so quickly and unceremoniously. Mellish, conversely, is slowly and torturously stabbed in the heart by the unnamed German soldier (Joerg Stadler) who Company C previously held captive before letting him go. On top of all the other deaths in that climactic final battle in Ramelle, the starkly contrasting fates that these characters respectively meet hit hard in ways that are different yet equally impactful and heart wrenching. But that’s only half of Company C, which gets to the four lead performances that (in my humble opinion) stand out as the best of the movie. First and foremost, Tom Hanks who brilliantly brings to life our leading man/everyman Captain John H. Miller. The way in which Spielberg centers the mystery of Miller’s backstory as a fixation of the other soldiers makes for some compelling, character-driven drama in the second act. But, overall, Miller represents the reluctant hero that knows the extreme risk of his men’s mission and doesn’t even necessarily agree with the moral gymnastics put forth by the Army to justify sending eight soldiers deep into enemy territory to rescue one. Yet, he never wavers in his determination to try and rescue Private Ryan out of his belief that doing so will be his ticket home. The two major dramatic forces at either of Miller’s sides are Private Richard Reiben (Edward Burns) and Sergeant Mike Horvath (Tom Sizemore). In many ways, these characters serve as polar opposites. Whereas Horvath is the veteran soldier unwavering in his loyalty to the authority above him, Reiben is the hotheaded gunner that can snap at a moment’s notice (particularly in direct protest against Miller’s decisions as captain). These stark differences are not more apparent than in the scene in question where Reiben fully embraces a gunshot to the head from Horvath’s pistol after refusing to follow Miller’s orders out of retaliation for Miller’s decision to let the German soldier “Mickey Mouse” go free. Without question, the tension between these two beta males is one of the best parts of this story. However, the character that I was always fascinated with and gripped by ever since first watching this film as a kid was Timothy Upham (Jeremy Davies), the newbie to Company C. As the newest addition to the group, he is not only singled out regularly as part of what can be described as stereotypical hazing but his ignorance of combat due to spending much of his time overseas as a typist makes him the prime eyes through which the audience can see the story play out. Rather than a badass sniper like Jackson or a down-and-dirty brawler like “Fish,” Upham is a straight-up coward. In fact, he wimps from doing the brave act multiple times during the climactic battle involving the bridge in Ramelle (which plays a role in getting Fish killed). While other actors could make this come off as annoying or degrading, Davies fully embraces Upham’s pure-hearted humanity that makes him so relatable and, thus, an effective perspective on war for the audience to give themselves over to. Which makes his one brave act—to avenge the death of Fish by killing “Mickey Mouse”—all the more tragic. Despite his best efforts to befriend (and perhaps turn) the German captive at the tail end of the second act, Upham recognizes that the man standing before him with his hands in the air surrendering is nothing but that: an enemy soldier who must be put down. He exemplifies the genuine human struggle of making an impossibly difficult choice in circumstances that (for most) are simply unimaginable. Which is why, in my humble opinion, Upham is the best character of Saving Private Ryan. Alas, it is not the characters that make this film a truly groundbreaking masterpiece. But something else entirely. The Groundbreaking That “something” is, without a doubt, Spielberg’s tackling of the combat sequences and violence. Regarding the former, Saving Private Ryan earned its reputation for having one of the (if not THE) most iconic opening battle sequence of any war film to date. In shooting this sequence the way he did, Spielberg aimed to “bring the audience onto the stage with me” to prevent viewers from becoming “spectators” but rather “demand them to be participants with those kids who had never seen combat before in real life.”[1] And damn does it work. Nobody who has seen just the first 25 minutes of Saving Private Ryan can tell me they didn’t feel fully immersed in the blood-soaked sands of Omaha Beach, Normandy while seeing dozens of men get shot, blown up, disemboweled, dismembered, and burned alive. The adrenaline spike from watching this helps the viewer vicariously experience the physiological sensation of being in combat (at least, as close to that as one can get without actually being a soldier in an active warzone). Simply put, the D-Day battle scene of this movie more than earns its reputation as a groundbreaking example of action-packed war cinema that, in many ways, overshadows so many other aspects of the film. That being said, I feel that people too often hold up this sequence in lieu of giving much-due credit to the movie’s exhilarating climactic fight between the rag-tag GIs led by Miller and Ryan’s companies and the Nazi troops trying to seize the bridge in the small town of Ramelle. Not only does this sequence include some fantastic character moments and shockingly tragic deaths (as I described above), but the way it brings the themes of the film to a fittingly messy conclusion makes for, in my humble opinion, one of the strongest third-act finales of any war movie in modern cinematic history. Woven into this final battle is, above all, Private Ryan watching virtually all of the men that risked their lives trudging through enemy territory to find him and send him home perish. Ultimately, it is Miller’s death that hits Ryan the most as Hanks mutters his character’s last soul-crushing (yet simultaneously uplifting) line: “Earn this.” Just picturing this moment in my mind while writing it makes me shudder excitably. Thus, it serves as the basis for a fantastic conclusion to the arcs of many of the characters (notably Miller, Ryan, and Upham). None of these battle sequences, however, would resonate as much as they do without the appropriate levels of blood, gore, and viscera present within them. While I understand some viewers’ squeamishness surrounding this film due to the horrifying, up-close-and-personal violence that defines its combat aesthetics, I think such a point is ultimately moot. While there are some war movies that rely too much on excessive gore, Spielberg’s approach is sensible and gracious by paying respect to the raw, visceral experience of modern-day combat that veterans of World War II (and other conflicts) often struggle to efficiently describe for the many of us who have never witnessed such unspeakable horrors. As Stanley Kubrick once said, “If it can be written, or thought, it can be filmed.” Perhaps this isn’t true for every single conceivable possibility, I think that Spielberg shows that a movie can help familiarize audiences with what it’s like to be a soldier in a way that both exhilarates and fascinates the minds of moviegoers while also paying the utmost respect to those whose lives were actually put on the line (and lost) in such situations. Thus, Saving Private Ryan never exploits veterans for sheer entertainment, but instead looks to their travails in war as inspiration to tell a grounded story and show people how hellish and infernal war truly is. Conclusion Need I say more? Saving Private Ryan remains, in my humble opinion, the gold standard for the war movie genre and has yet to be beaten. From its masterful pacing and empathetic characters to its quintessential exploration of the violent horrors of war through thoroughly exhilarating battle sequences, the film is just as relevant (both artistically and historically) one-quarter of a century after it first came out and caused some American military veterans to flee theaters due to how uncannily realistic it was in putting their experiences on the big screen. What are your thoughts on Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan? What other war movies would you recommend? What opinions of mine do you find absolutely ridiculous? Let me know in the comments below. Until next time, this has been… Yours Truly, Amateur Analyst [1] https://www.rogerebert.com/interviews/private-spielberg
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Austin McManusI have no academic or professional background in film production or criticism; I simply love watching and talking about movies. Archives
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