Saving Private Ryan

Rating: 9/10 (14 May 2010)

After the D-Day invasion of Omaha Beach, Ranger Captain John Miller (Tom Hanks) is tasked to put together a platoon of his choosing and find a paratrooper from the 101st Airbourne named Private James Ryan. With the platoon of his choosing (Tom Sizemore, Edward Burns, Barry Pepper, Adam Goldberg, Vin Diesel, Giovanni Ribisi, and Jeremy Davies) sets off in treachorous wartime France to find Private Ryan amongst a field of full of enemies and a split up 101st Airbourne.
World War I is often considering "The Great War" or "The War to End All Wars," but few military conflicts have caught the hearts and minds of the American, and the world, consciousness the way that World War II has. For the first time during a war, films were made about the war as early as 1939. Some of the greatest war films and TV series have been based on World War 2 from The Sands of Iwo Jima to Flags of Fathers to Band of Brothers. At the end of the 20th century, with a career full of highly critically and commercially successful hits under his belt, Steven Spielberg took another turn at the war film (following 1979's 1941) with Saving Private Ryan.
Saving Private Ryan is arguably the greatest war film ever made. The opening thirty minutes of the D-Day invasion is possibly the greatest scene ever committed to celluloid. But it's not just the harrowing scenes of war time that make this movie so great, it's the character building, the camaraderie between the soldiers, the devotion to duty, and the bravery of these men in combat. This movie truly depicts why World War 2 soldiers were possibly the greatest soldiers in US history.
One of the great things about the casting in Saving Private Ryan is the fact that they chose actors that look like everyday men rather than picking men that look like action heroes, and because of that the acting in this movie is amazing. Tom Hanks gives a wonderfully authoritative and still understated performance as Capt. John Miller. Vin Diesel hasn't been this good since, and Barry Pepper as is sensational as religious sniper Pvt. Daniel Jackson. Even Jeremy Davies as the green Cpl. Upham makes you feel for his character despite his very obvious flaws as a soldier.
The one thing that drags this movie down though is Spielberg's slavish devotion to sentimentality. The bookends to the film are completely unneeded and drags down what is otherwise an utterly great movie. Don't get me wrong, a former soldier's sentimentality for the one's who died to save him has it's place, I just feel as though that should have been more reserved for the former soldiers watching this movie remembering those who died with and for them then on the screen in this movie. Rather, the movie should have just been devoted to remembering the bravery and camaraderie of the men who fought in the war.
Overall, though, in the scheme of things, despite the minor flaw that I have with this movie, it is definitely still the greatest movie in my mind dedicated to the men who have served our country. I don't just recommend this movie, if you haven't seen this you need to watch it, and now that it's out on Blu-Ray this is the perfect time to pick up this movie and watch it, or to watch it again.
4.5/5