Saving Private Ryan Essay

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Steven Spielberg is known for being an extraordinary director. He has directed many wonderful films and he can add this one to his resume. “Saving Private Ryan” is a war film set in the battlefields of 1944 Europe. Tom Hanks stars as Captain John H. Miller who leads a troop of seven men to locate and bring back Private James Ryan (Matt Damon) for propaganda reasons. His other three brothers were killed in action and they don’t want to have to send another death letter to their mother. The film’s opening sequence is a very graphic and realistic depiction of what happened during D-Day. It is also one of the greatest cinematic war scenes I have ever witnessed. The soldiers are terrified as they arrive upon Omaha Beach packed like sardines into boats. As soon as the boat hatch opens an array of bullets impact …show more content…

It is being protected by a mounted machine gunner. The group has a choice to make, they can go around the radar center and avoid it entirely, or risk their lives and attack the center. They choose the latter and it concludes into one of the many brilliant battle scenes in the film. One thing I will criticize about this film is that it doesn’t share much about the characters personal lives. The film shares with us the backstory of Capt. Miller (Tom Hanks) who was an English teacher before entering the army, but not the rest of the characters. This would bring more emotional attachment from the viewer to the characters. Cpl. Upham (Jeremy Davies) is a very interesting character who was brought along into the group because he can speak German and French fluently. I think he did an outstanding job as playing the scared interpreter. Audiences can relate to him because this war was fought by young civilians who were unprepared for war. It was almost as if you were watching yourself being thrown into battle. The other actors did a great job portraying their characters as

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