Number 15 on my List of Top 20 Films of All Time... Saving Private Ryan Directed by Steven Spielberg Release date 1998
It would be easy for me to begin this review describing the opening scene at Normandy. It is widely regarded as the best visual representation of war every put on film and has been dissected and studied for 20 years. I would wager that as you are reading this, you too are seeing that scene play out in your mind. However, it is after your heart stops pounding and the smoke begins to clear that I want to talk about. Its after the hundreds and hundreds of American soldiers are shown washing up on shore, the water completely crimson. Its after those images that Spielberg juxtaposes the impact of the war abroad to the one at home with three close ups of secretaries typing letters to the fallen's parents. You hear a voice over of what the letters are saying over and over as one of the typist begin to realize that three of the soldiers that have now died are brothers and that their mother will be getting all three letters on the same day. Fast forward a few seconds to the army car pulling up into the mothers drive way and an officer and Army chaplain getting out. You see the mother trembling and almost fainting as she limps to the ground in agony. This is my lasting image of the film and Spielberg's way of explaining the devastation of this war and its reach. Of course this sets the table for the plot of the film. A group of soldiers must go through literal hell to pull someone from it.
My love of film comes a lot from the experiences that I have had in the theater watching them. Needless to say I am in the now minority that thinks the only way to truly appreciate a great film is to see it on the big screen in the theater the way the filmmaker intended it to be seen. I can remember sitting next to my Dad during “Saving Private Ryan” and feeling his tension, really the whole crowds tension as the theater was very full that afternoon. It was like we were all experiencing something totally revolutionary and new all at the same time. Nothing could of prepared us for what was to come in this movie. Even Tom Hanks, seemed to fade into the rest of the cast under the understanding that what was being seen was to be done so with reverence. I can remember Dad being openly outraged when Jeremy Davies character Upham failed to muster the courage to climb those stairs to help his fellow solider who was being stabbed by a German. I can remember turning on Hanks when he made the decision to take that machine gun instead of going around it, resulting in Wade's death. As most people in the theater were that day, I can remember my dad openly sobbing when the credits began to roll. I felt like I never understood anything about WWII until that moment. The sacrifice. The horror. The patriotism. It all took on new meaning for me that Summer day. That is the power of cinema. That is the power of Spielberg. Because of this I have long been an advocate of this film being required viewing for every High School student and should be added to all history curriculum.
The film went on to win many, many awards that year. It is in my opinion Spielberg's best and most important film and there is no question it is THE definitive war film ever made.
The late Roger Ebert said of “Saving Private Ryan”, “weeping is an incomplete response, letting the audience off the hook. This film embodies ideas. After the immediate experience begins to fade, the implications remain and grow.”
The implications still remain to this day. The impact of Steven Spielberg's WWII masterpiece remain in each and every viewing. Number 15 on my list. Saving Private Ryan.