Saving Private Ryan (1998)
***** out of *****
Cast: Tom Hanks, Edward Burns, Tom Sizemore, Jeremy Davies, Vin Diesel, Adam Goldberg, Barry Pepper, Giovanni Ribisi, Matt Damon, Dennis Farina, Ted Danson, Paul Giamatti
Written by: Robert Rodat Directed by: Steven Spielberg Running Time: 169 minutes
When I was a little kid (before I even started school), I used to think that war had spectators like a sporting event would. I thought that there were bleachers or something similar where people from opposing countries would sit and watch (look, I was just five years old, ok?) Well, Saving Private Ryan makes you feel like you are a spectator in World War II, sitting just far enough away as to not get killed. It's the first war film I've ever seen that seemingly presents war as it probably was, instead of how Hollywood thinks it was.
The film starts with the invasion of Normandy during World War II. And right away you'll know that you're not about to see just another war film. We see one of the invasion boats open up it's doors and within a second at least ten soldiers are brutally killed. It's such a powerful jolt, and I've never seen anything like it. Compare it to a scene from another great WWII movie The Longest Day where during the invasion of Normandy, Sean Connery jumps out of his invasion boat, falls into the water, and it's treated like a wacky little moment. Nothing against The Longest Day, but I think that Saving Private Ryan is probably a little closer to reality.
After an incredibly brutal 20-30 minutes, we come to the plot of the film. Three brothers have been killed and their mother is about to receive all three telegrams announcing their deaths. It's learned that there's a fourth brother, Private James Ryan, who is somewhere behind enemy lines. A squad of soldiers (led by Tom Hanks in another outstanding dramatic performance) is ordered to go and find him, so that he can be sent home.
The plot however, just isn't too crucial to the film. Saving Private Ryan isn't about finding a man and sending him home, it's about war, about what soldiers go through, and the overall devastation that war causes. The violence in the film is shockingly brutal. It may seem gratuitous, but then again, so is war.
I didn't really care for the film's wrap-around scenes, the scenes which open and close the film. In them, an elderly Ryan visits the graves of the fallen soldiers from the film. While the scene's intentions are good, they just don't mesh with the rest of the film. To me they came off like cheesy TV-movie type theatrics. That's pretty much my only gripe though, and it can be easily overlooked thanks to the excellence of the rest of the film.
So it all comes down to this: is Saving Private Ryan a good movie? Yes, it most certainly is. But it's more of a great film, or rather an example of great filmmaking, than a great story. It's certainly not something I'd call entertaining, not something that I'd want to watch over and over again. It's powerful, moving, and clearly the front-runner for an Academy Award in so many categories. It's easily the best film Spielberg has ever made, maybe not the best story he's ever told, but the greatest film he's ever put together. [R]
The Jacksonville Film Journal -- Film Reviews by Chuck Dowling URL: http://users.southeast.net/~chuckd21/ Email: chuckd21@leading.net
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