Director Report Card: Steven Spielberg (1998)

21. Saving Private Ryan

Steven Spielberg grew up listening to his father's war stories, which gave him a life-long fascination with World War II. This interest peaked when Tom Hanks brought Spielberg a project written by Robert Rodat. Inspired by the story of the Niland brothers – four siblings who served in the war, two dying at Normandy and one presumed dead in Burma, forcing the return of the fourth – Rodat's screenplay had been circulating in Hollywood for several years. Spielberg initially envisioned the project as a nostalgic adventure film. After meeting with a number of actual veterans of the D-Day invasion, Spielberg's intentions changed. He decided to make "Saving Private Ryan" as realistic a war film as had ever been made, to thoroughly deglamorize the conflict. The result would be critically acclaimed, became the highest grossing film of 1998, win Spielberg his second Best Director Oscar, and is still regarded as one of his best works.

On June 6th, 1944, Captain John H. Miller is but one of a hundred American soldiers landing on Omaha Beach. Miller manages to make it behind enemy lines, taking control of a group of scattered soldiers. Once in Normandy, Miller and his team are given a mission: Three of the four Ryan brothers from Iowa have been killed in action. The fourth, James Ryan, is reported missing. Miller and his team – including an inexperienced translator named Upham – are tasked with finding Ryan and returning him home. The group question their duty as they march through France, facing heavy resistance and losses along the way.

"Saving Private Ryan" has been most acclaimed for its opening sequence, depicting the Normandy landing. Rightfully so, as it's one of the most startling sequences of Spielberg's entire career. The combat zone is depicted as Hell on earth, the beach littered with dead bodies and utter chaos. Surreal, grisly sights play out all around Miller, such as a soldier fruitlessly searching for his severed arm or another man being saved by his helmet only to have his brains blown out the second he removes it. A man he's talking to one minute has no face the next. Spielberg drags us through this mayhem, Miller's shell-shocked reaction re-enforced by several slow-motion pans over the chaos. We feel the bullets zip pass our heads, the heat from the flames, the shock waves from the explosions. Once it's finally over, the viewer can't help but feel their heart thump. The sequence does everything it can to make sure the audience feels the sheer terror the soldiers felt on that beach, on that day.

If "Saving Private Ryan" accomplishes nothing else, it thoroughly dismisses the myth that there's any glory in dying on the battlefield. One of the film's most unforgettable moment involves a young soldier laying in the water and sand, his intestines spooling from his belly, as he screams for his mother. Later, one of Miller's men is fatally shot. As he slowly bleeds to death, he begs for morphine simply to ease the pain. As he fades away, he also begs for his mama. These men, like so many in any war, died horribly. As their bodies were torn apart and they faced their last minutes alive, they weren't thinking about honor or their country. They just wanted the awful pain to stop, to feel loved and comforted and safe when they knew nothing of the sort was coming.

If there's no glory in actually dying in war, "Saving Private Ryan" seems determined to show there's no honor in combat either. The American soldiers here are frequently depicted doing terrible things. After marching across the beach, a group of German soldiers come to them, asking to be taken prisoner. Instead, they are gunned down, their pleas ignored. We watch the burning bodies of men crawl out of enemy bunkers, the Americans instructed to "let them burn." Later, when Miller's team captures a German soldier, an argument breaks out over whether taking him prisoner or killing him is the proper thing to do. It's not right. It's not ethical. War robs men of their humanity, hardens their hearts, and makes them disposed to do terrible things.

Of course, these actions aren't performed in a vacuum. Each man is terrified for his life, knowing the other side is doing everything they can to kill them too. "Saving Private Ryan" isn't just committed to showing the visceral effects of combat but the psychological ramifications as well. As they approach the beach, multiple soldiers are depicted as vomiting from anxiety or trembling with fear. After successfully surviving the landing, Miller's most sarcastic soldier breaks down into sobs. The captain himself experiences an unexplained shakiness in his hand all throughout the film, the constant stress of being overseas, of his life always being in danger, clearly taking its toll. Later, another principal character is paralyzed with terror, reduced to a blubbering child. These are ordinary people, tossed into an impossible situation, and their psyches can't survive such a strain, even if their bodies do.

So many war movies have been built around the concept of brotherhood among soldiers in combat, that we basically take the idea for granted now. If a group of guys are going on a mission together, it's almost a given that they'll form a bond before it's over. (Making the inevitable loss unavoidable in war all the more tragic.) Yet “Saving Private Ryan” considers what this camaraderie really means. The script is well aware of the trope, as Upham tells the men on this mission with him that he's writing a book on this exact subject, to which he gets sarcastically rebuffed. Yet these men do share a special bond, crying out as they watch one of their own slowly bleed out from sniper fire. “Saving Private Ryan” examines the fact that these bonds are so strong precisely because these guys are on the verge of death every minute together.

Something else that the soldiers bond over is their mutual resentment of Private James Ryan. It takes very little time for the men to start to wonder what makes this guy – off-screen for most of the movie – any more special than them. As soon as their brothers-in-arms start to die, this resentment becomes very real. The idea of rescuing another man, of risking your own life for someone's well fair, is probably the most easily understood concept of heroism. Much like the brotherly bonds formed on the battlefield, “Saving Private Ryan” really asks us to consider the price of heroism. If bringing another mother's son home is a heroic deed, it also means other mothers and fathers will loose their sons. It's an ugly sacrifice that puts the inherit unfairness of war, the brutality of such an act, into sharp reflect.

This becomes especially clear in the very final scene, when the film returns to its framing device in the modern day. When Ryan, now as an old man, walks to the Normandy Memorial cemetery and collapses at the grave of Captain Miller. He asks his wife if he's “a good man” and it's a question full of implications. Captain Miller asked him to honor the sacrifices he and his men made for Ryan's sake, to live a good life. Yet how can anyone really live up to such a promise? What truly makes one man worth more than any other? The answer is, obviously, nothing. Ryan's life wasn't worth more than anyone else's, because he's a man just like any other person. He has to grapple with that for the rest of his life.

It's not difficult to figure out why this story would resonate with Spielberg specifically. No reoccurring theme has defined the director's career more than the idea of family, of the cost of it being broken and the value when it's complete. One of the few scenes outside of the European Theater in “Saving Private Ryan” emphasizes this clearly. We watch from the interior of the Ryan household as we see the men arrive to tell the mother three of her four boys are dead. She silently collapses to her knees. It's a short scene but it makes abundantly clear the devastating effect the war had on the home front. Family – clearly the most precious thing of all to Spielberg – was totally destroyed by the conflict. It makes the global, political ramifications of World War II feel all the more personal and intimate.

The desire to make the audience feel a personal connection to the war does not end there. Spielberg's direction and Janusz Kamiński's cinematography is determined to put the viewer right in the middle of combat. The camera work often involves shaky close-ups on the actors and their environments. This creates a documentary-like flavor, making the blast from the bombs and the everyone's tremors of fear transcend the theater screen and reach the viewer. When focused on a soldier's hand as it stiffens up in the rain, blood pooling around him, it feels especially striking. Any war movie attempting to explores the horrors of the battlefield has to contend with the unavoidable fact that action sequences are exciting to watch on-screen. Spielberg can't overcome this totally. Yet "Saving Private Ryan" emphasizes the brutality of the violence and the terror of everyone involved to make its point. When you see heads tore off by machine gun fire or watch as our company of boys are almost crushed by an incoming tank, you react with horror, not anticipation.

Of course, Spielberg is not simply interested in brutality. The director has a fundamentally sentimental heart. His best movies balance out this fondness for home, family  and gentle humanity and the darkness of the world, the inevitability of death and heartbreak. This is certainly very true of "Saving Private Ryan." Some of the film's most effecting scenes, in retrospective, are its quietest. Such as Miller discussing the mission with his team inside the silent darkness of a church. Or, pointedly, a moment before the action packed climax. Ryan sits down with the rest of the troops and listens to a German love song. He tells a story about a flirtatious encounter with a busty woman in his mother's shop. Memories like that is what got him, and many boys overseas, through the war. You see this in Adrian Caparzo's insistence in protecting a young French girl, as she reminds him of his niece. "Saving Private Ryan" is all about how family, how the peace you have at home with the people you love, is worth preserving even in the face of the indescribable horrors of war. Moments like this emphasize that. 

Tom Hanks being cast as Captain Miller makes great use of his all-American persona as the Nicest Guy in Hollywood. We learn, late in the film, that Miller was a school teacher and a baseball coach back home, something that seemed very natural and obvious to everyone at the time. This is in contrast to Miller's persona on the battlefield, which is hardened and determined to complete the mission. This is certainly an intentional contrast to Hanks' wholesome public image. These were the kind of men deployed overseas: Fathers, husbands, normal guys plucked out of small towns and dropped into the middle of a hellish war. They were forced to make the hardest decisions a person can make and subsequently lost their innocence. Seeing Hanks thrust into this part is a brilliant stroke that shows what is at stakes in the film. Miller is honorable and duty-driven, qualities that we all can aspire to, but Hanks' weary performance makes it clear that attribute comes as a hideous cost. 

Hanks is supported by a great line-up of character actors. Tom Sizemore's intense mixture of chumminess and subtly off putting edge is perfectly served in the role of Mike Horvath, another battle-hardened soldier who does many questionable things but remains his humanity. Adam Goldberg is similarly ideally cast as the sarcastic "Fish" Mellish, who is nevertheless given several opportunities to really show off his skills as a serious actor. The fresh-faced boyish of Jeremy Davis, the squinty-eyed intensity of Barry Pepper, and the Hollywood star smile and good looks of Matt Damon all totally serve their roles. Even smaller parts are filled with soon-to-be-recognized faces like Vin Diesel, Bryan Cranston, and Nathan Fillion. I guess it's not surprising that Steven Spielberg and the team he surrounds himself with can recognize stardom when they see it, instinctively honing in on the best qualities an actor has. 

As you've probably come to expect, Spielberg would recruit John Williams to provide "Saving Private Ryan" with a fittingly sweeping score. The main title music is a majestic composition characterized by soaring, if slightly mournful, horns and a militaristic drum beat. It's a very patriotic piece of music, exactly summoning the mood of a movie about honor in war and the sacrifice of soldiers. It's almost too perfect, too professional, a score. Spielberg smartly, much as he did in "Schindler's List," makes the scenes without music just as meaningful as those with it. Most of the battle scenes don't feature Williams' score, understanding that the noise and chaos of the battlefield is the best way to convey the mood the movie is going for. Williams' music tugs at the heartstrings. The composer is extremely good at getting that kind of reaction. But that earnestness only works when contrasted with the film's brutality, which is why the movie saves Williams' grandiose music for the quieter moments, when it can make the proper impact. 

In modern parlance, "Saving Private Ryan" is an unlikely blockbuster. It's a serious, adult movie that grapples with serious subjects in an even-handed, mature way, never sacrificing the ruthlessness of its setting. Not the kind of thing you'd expect to make 428 million dollars in 2023. Yet the film was a phenomenon in 1998. It reignited interest in World War II while also generating a visceral emotional reaction in many of the surviving vets that saw it. The film seems to be highly regarded as one of the few war movies to truly capture the feeling of being in combat, the complex reactions that produce in the human psyche. That complexity is what I most admire about "Saving Private Ryan." It doesn't simplify the war into a battle between good and evil, in service of ra-ra jingoism. It shows that people died in horrible ways and that war compromises even the best hearts. Yet it also shines a line on the best qualities people can have, that linger on in spite of – not because of – the things that are done on the battlefield. [Grade: A]