Saving Private Ryan

Rating: 7/10 (9 May 2016)

Steven Spielberg's gripping epic, Saving Private Ryan was a film that went to great lengths to accurately depict the events of WWII. The 1998 Best Picture winner starring Tom Hanks, Matt Damon, and a great ensemble cast tells the story of the sacrifice of many for the one. Conveying the message of brotherhood and sacrifice, Spielberg drove the message home through his grand WWII epic.
Saving Private Ryan opens with the allied invasion of Normandy with an intensely elaborate 12-minute scene in which Spielberg captures the essence of war with incredible accuracy. During the invasion, two brothers are killed, along with many others. Previously, a third brother was killed as well and thankfully, a sharp-eyed stenographer noticed that the mother, Mrs. Ryan (Amanda Boxer) would be receiving all three telegraphs informing her of her 3 son's deaths on the same day. When the Army General, George C. Marshall (Harve Presnell) learns of a fourth enlisted brother, he takes the opportunity to alleviate the mother's stress and find the fourth brother and return him home safely to his family. Marshall assembles a group of 8 men on a death- defying mission to find Private Ryan and get him to safety.
I will doubtfully never tire of a film told backward, as Saving Private Ryan was. We first meet an elderly gentleman that we later find out is present-day Private Ryan visiting Arlington National Cemetery with his family. Spielberg especially uses this technique to its full capacity in this film, allowing the audience to see how much sacrifice is worth when we see a trove of people that wouldn't have been possible without the mission to save Private Ryan. The opening battle scene with the invasion of Normandy was obviously intense and gripping. Spielberg went to great lengths to ensure the film's realism, even down to the positioning of body's on the beach. On a much lighter note, it was fun to see the cameos that were frequent and unexpected throughout the movie. We see Ted Danson and Bryan Cranston with bit parts in the film and unexpected big name cameos that don't distract from the story are always fun. There were several scenes with great use of characters storytelling throughout the film. This device was well utilized and helped distract from how much the film slowed down in the middle, or how needlessly long some of the battle scenes were. I typically find Spielberg films over the top and just aiming too hard for the jugular of the audience; Saving Private Ryan was probably doing those things too, but it was a better film in spite of it than some other Spielberg productions.