Saving Private Ryan (1998)
Director: Steven Spielberg Cast: Tom Hanks, Edward Burns, Tom Sizemore, Jeremy Davies, Vin Diesel, Adam Goldberg, Barry Pepper, Giovanni Ribisi, Matt Damon Screenplay: Robert Rodat Producers: Ian Bryce, Mark Gordon, Gary Levinsohn Runtime: 169 min. US Distribution: DreamWorks/Paramount Rated R: extreme and graphic gore and violence, profanity
By Nathaniel R. Atcheson (nate@pyramid.net)
Saving Private Ryan is perhaps the first film I've ever seen that called me back for a second viewing before I even decided the way I felt about it. I knew it had invaded me the first time, for I had ultra-violent nightmares the night after I saw it. I couldn't stop thinking about the film for three days; the graphic viscera of every scene imprinted images on my mind, images that aren't likely to ever leave me. I doubt there are many films in existence that are as visually powerful as Saving Private Ryan, and I know there's not one that's more horrifyingly violent.
As everyone knows, this is Steven Spielberg's latest war film, though his first attempt at actually capturing the horror of warfare. I've never been in war -- and it's not likely that I ever will be -- but I think experiencing Saving Private Ryan is the closest I'll ever come. After watching this film, I felt like I had survived a war. I was tired, exhilarated, battered, and disturbed. It's not a pleasant experience, but it's a profoundly powerful one, and I recommend that everyone see it. It puts the realism back into violence.
After a short prologue, Spielberg jumps right into battle, with a truly amazing recreation of the invasion of Omaha Beach on June 6th, 1944. We meet our characters, Captain Miller (Tom Hanks), his Sergeant (Tom Sizemore), and their men, Privates Reiben (Edward Burns), Mellish (Adam Goldberg), Jackson (Barry Pepper), and Wade (Giovanni Ribisi). They forge the beach and, after about a half hour of watching their comrades undergo intense attack from the Germans, they manage to take the beach. It's at this point that Miller gets a new assignment: he and his men are to go inland and search for Private James Ryan; Ryan's brothers have all been killed in combat, and the powers-that-be want to get the remaining man back to his mother in Iowa. The film progresses from there, with Miller and his men engaging in various battles and risking their lives to find a man who may not even be alive.
Saving Private Ryan is the most violent film I've ever seen. Paul Verhoeven has a knack for gory violence, but his films are cartoons by comparison. And horror films that bank on gore are nothing compared to this, because here it all feels real. Spielberg is entirely responsible for the look and feel of this film, and it proves that he can paint a portrait of pure terror without holding back. In general, the style is sharp, and every scene appears to be in deep focus (one can see every dust particle that goes flying into the air with each explosion). I read that Spielberg drained 40% of the color from the film, and what results are images that look stark and harrowing, particularly in the ravaged town where the final battle takes place. In addition, the sound effects editing and special effects are so good that viewers simply forget that they are watching a film.
The violence is not exploitative, and that's why it feels so real. We get glimpses of a man lying on a beach, holding his entrails, calling for his mother. We see men explode into bloody fragments of human waste. We see soldiers get blown to pieces by machinegun fire, while their mangled limbs disperse about the ground. Nothing I can write here will prepare you for the images in Saving Private Ryan, and nothing I say can describe it in a way that feels as realistic as Spielberg has made it. I've never experienced a film that feels as real as this one.
The film is long, and Spielberg manages to form his characters effectively. Hanks gives a touching, subtle performance as the Captain, whose identity is concealed from his men. He is convincing in this role, even though he doesn't initially seem like a military type (although I imagine that this is the point, seeing as how most people drafted into war aren't the military type). Sizemore is excellent, giving a powerful performance as the loyal Sergeant. Jeremy Davies is terrific as an interpreter who gets forced into battle, and his subplot is fascinating. Other supporting performances by Burns, Goldberg, Pepper, Ribisi, and Matt Damon (as Private Ryan) are all surprisingly memorable.
Many people accept Spielberg's name as solid gold, as if his attachment with any motion picture assures its quality. I think he's talented, but, like all directorsb he has his ups (Schindler's List, Empire of the Sun) and his downs (Always, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom). There are elements common in all of his films that I don't like, and he frequently uses sentimentality at the worst times. Saving Private Ryan has some serious problems in this arena; the first and last scenes, for instance, are truly unbearable, and should have been cut from the film entirely. On the whole, however, the sensitive material here is handled with surprising honesty, and a few of the scenes are powerful because Spielberg is almost cold in his observations of them.
There are other flaws, aside from the occasional sentimentality. Even though the film looks disturbingly real, the story still has that contrived Hollywood feel. The general idea is a good one, and the framework is effective, but a lot of this relies on chance and luck, and I don't like it when stories need to fall back on luck. There are also some character developments late in the film that had me puzzled. Most frustrating, however, is that, for all the realism in the war scenes, the main characters who die are all given quiet, cinematic death scenes. That's not to say that they aren't engrossing or moving scenes, because they are, but it's moments like these that remind me that I'm watching something that isn't real. It would have been far more effective to kill characters for whom we feel something in the same graphic manner that floods the rest the film.
In addition, I'm not sure how Spielberg wants us to feel in the end. It seems that he wanted to make a film that was simply about war, but Saving Private Ryan spends more time on the characters and story than it does on the horrors of war. The first and last shots are of an American flag, but I'm not sure why. The film feels oddly indifferent to the purpose of World War II -- in some scenes, the Germans are almost sympathetic, and sometimes Spielberg demonizes the American soldiers. I actually like this element, but it makes me confused about the moral center of the film. And even though it's so violent, I'm not sure that it's particularly anti-war. I like that the film stimulated my thought in this manner, but I would have preferred a little more guidance.
It's not often that I bother with negative criticism when I recommend a film so highly. Saving Private Ryan, as a whole, is not even close to perfection -- there are flaws in its execution that are too large to ignore. But as a war film, as a violent, forceful, and aggressive vision of some of the most violent moments in human history, it is as close to perfect as it could have been. So many of the images in this picture are stamped on my brain, and have forced their way into my subconscious in a manner no film ever has. And for all the violence, for every mind-numbing shot of a human being undergoing intense physical torture, this is still a film that I will want to watch in the future. Spielberg may be overrated, but it takes a unique talent to make me want to repeatedly endure a film this unpleasant.
**** out of **** (9/10, A)
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Nathaniel R. Atcheson
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