Realism In Saving Private Ryan

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Realism in Saving Private Ryan

The movie, “Saving Private Ryan” is a quintessential World War II movie. Directed by Steven Spielberg, the WWII saga takes place during and immediately following D-Day. The story follows seven Army Rangers (Ed Burns, Tom Sizemore, Giovanni Ribisi, Barry Pepper, Adam Goldberg, Vin Diesel, and Jeremy Davies) led by Captain John Miller (Tom Hanks), on the search, thru Nazi occupied France, for Private James Ryan (Matt Damon). Pvt. Ryan is being “rescued” and sent home, because his three older brothers have all been killed in the war. The U.S. government has decided to spare Mrs. Ryan the torture of loosing another son. Made in 1998, by DreamWorks and Paramount pictures this movie tells a heart-wrenching story with excellent cinematography.
“Saving Private Ryan” is one of the most realistic war movies ever created. The opening scene is Omaha beach, on the Normandy coast of France, on D-Day, June 6,1944. The troops are arriving at the beach in the LCVP boats. The young boys are let out in the ocean (the boats can’t go to shore because of the mines) and shooting starts. Bullets go whizzing by, and lives are being lost everywhere. For 25 minutes the screen is filled with the true horrors of combat that most war movies cannot capture: young boys dieing, many whose limbs or other body parts have been exploded. This scene is the most realistic of the entire movie. Many WWII vets thought the opening scene was very realistic. One Veteran stated, “There were people falling and explosions going off around you, and it was not hard to imagine that the carnage was real, that it was caused by bullets, mortars, and shells. There’s terror in our eyes in some of those scenes, and rightly so, because we were genuinely scared…and we knew that it was fake”(SPR).
Saving Private Ryan does have some parts that are purely movie. In the opening scene Cpt. Miller and his men secure the be...