Saving Private Ryan
Chad'z rating: **** (out of 4 = excellent)
1998, R, 170 minutes [2 hours, 50 minutes]
[drama]
starring: Tom Hanks (Captain Miller); Tom Sizemore (Sergeant Horvath), Edward Burns (Private Reiben), Jeremy Davies (Corporal Upham); written by Robert Rodat; produced by Ian Bryce, Mark Gordon, Gary Levinsohn; Steven Spielberg; directed by Steven Spielberg.
Seen August 8, 1998 at 6 p.m. at Rotterdam Square Cinemas (Rotterdam, NY), theater #6, by myself for free using my Sony/Loews critic's pass. [theater rating: ***: good seats, sound, and picture]
War is a topic that can't help but be glorified any way it is portrayed by the media. Movies, documentaries, and even history books have a way of making the darker side of humanity exciting since the most general aspects are focused on, such as strategy, politics, and victory. It's easy to forget war, in its most basic form, is a battle of armies out to slaughter each other. Forgotten more easily is the fact that each soldier, no matter what his rank or importance, is a real flesh-and-blood person and not just a number. "Saving Private Ryan" is one of the few films that dares play up this aspect, especially in its unapologetic, realistic delivery. It proves there's a huge difference between battling and killing.
The film opens with one of the most graphic, disturbing scenes in recent memory. It's World War II, D-Day to be exact, and the U.S. military is invading Omaha Beach where the Nazis are more than ready for them. Spielberg uses many techniques to create for a total sense of reality. Instead of positioned cameras, the footage here seems to have been shot by camera operators running alongside soldiers as if they were just as scared. There is no sense of stability, but of constant, anxious, and confusing motion, giving us the feeling of being in the middle of the battle, and just a vulnerable as the poor troops.
"Poor" is a proper word to describe how pathetic and yet innocent the men fighting are. There is little to no dialogue throughout the loud battle and no prologue to define any characters. We don't get the feeling these are handsome actors playing heroic roles, but that these are men about to kill and be killed for reasons beyond their understanding. The Nazis are not portrayed as enemies to be hated, but as people that must be destroyed because they're there.
In the movies, the good guys can run through a firestorm of bullets and bombs and not get a scratch, but in reality that wouldn't happen. The men have nothing to shield or protect them besides some metal flanks and dead bodies. They are sitting ducks and we realize this through the perspective of the well-secured Germans who can actually see who, what, and where they're shooting, unlike the Americans who must fire in a general direction to avoid getting their heads blown off.
Perhaps the film is flawed by not providing any backstory on the war itself and who the men really are, but that seems to be part of the theme. The film seems to rely on the audience's sense of patriotism, that the American military is "right" and good and that the Nazis are "inherently evil." The battle scene eventually focuses on a group of men who have miraculously survived and made their way close to the enemy stronghold (a whole 50-foot progression), and begin to inflict some damage. I have to admit that once the first glimpse of victory over the Nazis sprang up, I couldn't help but feel some sense of joy and relief. To triumph against all odds is a cliche to be sure, but there's nothing cliche about the graphic, detailed, atmosphere here because it really happened.
One of the most surprising aspects of the film is how little story construction there is, and yet the events that take place make sense and are interesting. The plot is practically irrelevant since the film is more concerned with the reality of the war and the soldiers we meet. Tom Hanks stars as Captain Miller, a relatively average man who happens to be the leader of a platoon. He's never obsessive or any such generic, cartoonish characteristic that might dominate a character like this. He doesn't want to be there any more than his men, but when he is given a mission he intends to carry it out. The mission the film is concerned with is, as the title states, saving Private Ryan.
Through a series of command started by an ordinary clerical worker, it is brought to a general's attention that three brothers from Iowa have been killed in action and their mother will receive notices of each's death simultaneously. When they learn a fourth brother is stationed somewhere in Europe, they make it a top priority to have him returned safely to his mother. It's easy to sympathize with this situation, after all, no one should have to lose all their children at once. But finding one man in this war is, as Miller puts it, "Like trying to find a needle in a stack of needles."
The saving of Private Ryan isn't just a dramatic device, but a thematic one. His salvation represents the sense of innocence the country, the world even, was trying to convince itself it still had. When Miller's company hears of the mission, they scoff at the idea assuming he is dead, but Miller isn't so quick to shrug it off. He knows the only thing that can really save soldiers from death is hope, and now he has the opportunity to make someone's sense of hope a reality.
The mission to find Ryan gives Miller's group a destination, but not direction. Along the way many things happen to them, both good and bad. A few battles are fought, not to be major accomplishments for the war, but because they encounter German soldiers and have no other choice. The act of killing itself becomes one of the film's major philosophical metaphors. The soldiers don't mind killing other soldiers in blind battle, but when they come across a lone survivor who begs them to let him go, they can barely stop themselves from killing him in cold blood as some kind of vengeance for their losses.
Unfortunately, death is a fact of war, and most films try to avoid it when it comes to the main characters, but here Spielberg doesn't want us to think these men are invincible. In fact, only a small amount of color and personality is sketched into each man, and the performances are good enough to make this method work. Although the characters are somewhat typical, the actors maintain control over the material at all time. Whether they're arguing with each other, telling stories of back home, or fighting the Germans, they never go overboard and always seem believable. Sure, there's a zinger here and there, but war doesn't change the fact boys will be boys. If and when one dies we too can feel the loss, even though we hardly knew them.
The final act brings the story full circle with another tremendous, violent battle sequence. Private Ryan has been found, but facing four to one odds, can the Americans defeat the Germans and keep Ryan alive? That's not a premise for thrills, it's symbolic of everything the film has worked for. It would be wrong to say the film has either a happy or sad ending, it ends the way it must end.
I remember reading a "Calvin & Hobbes" comic strip where Calvin asked his dad something like, "Dad, how do armies of men killing each other solve problems?" "Saving Private Ryan" is the adult version of that question.
e-mail: ChadPolenz@aol.com (C) 1998 Chad Polenz
Member of: The Online Film Critics Society The Internet Movie Critics Association The Online Movie-Goers Academy
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