Monumental film never to be forgotten...

Rating: 10/10 (2 March 1999)

Spielberg's 2nd masterpiece of war is a shocking and relentless epic that is a perfect blend of emotion and current film technology. There has never been a battle scene as brutally realized as the storming of Omaha Beach, and no other filmmaker has come anywhere remotely close to capturing the horrors of war. You find yourself forgetting where you are and who is even in this 'movie'. I say this meaning the film seems like a documentary, as well as a first hand account, exemplified in the compelling scenes where Hanks' Captain Miller sees everything in slow motion, blood splattering on him and all. The carnage is as close to war as anyone who has never been to war can get. Forget APOCALYPSE, forget THIN RED LINE, forget even PLATOON. This is it.
Actors who have participated in the film say they cannot believe what is on the screen. Matt Damon is quoted as saying he forgot he was in the film while watching the final sequence. People will ask them forever what it was like to be in this picture. Veterans have sent their thanks to Spielberg and his crew for honoring them with this absolute classic. It will be studied forever in schools, grammar on up. It deserves every award it will receive and we all a owe debt to those who made such an important and awesome film that shows us the depths of the human condition, human collaboration, and human hell. Best Picture of the year, if not the decade. It will be universally immortalized.