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Saving Private Ryan Film Analysis

Decent Essays

Americans pride themselves with their war efforts during World War II. Americans pride ourselves so much on their ability to keep fighting, even though we were faced with many obstacles that countless Hollywood directors have been led to make movies about the era and American perseverance. Steven Spielberg was no exception. Saving Private Ryan, directed by Spielberg in 1998, is a two hour and forty five minute film about a group of eight soldiers during World War II who trek deep into German territory in France to find Private James Ryan, whose three brothers have been killed in combat, in order to tell him that he is being sent home. Throughout the movie, the viewer is exposed to the many gruesome scenes between two enemies, America and Germany, …show more content…

Through the hardships that we had to face, together individually and as a nation, we pressed on and kept fighting, because the most important thing in our lives at the time was beating the Germans. During the film, there are many examples of this mentality. In a very early scene of the movie, the audience is exposed to this mentality. At the battle of Omaha, people dying all over the place, but you never saw a soldier and cry about a fallen friend. You may have seen him hiding behind something to avoid getting hit, but he would eventually come out, continue fighting and only stop until they were gunned down. In one point in this scene, there is a soldier whose arm had been blown off, but instead of lying on the ground and waiting for someone to do something about it, the soldier picks up his arm and keeps running up the beach. The same goes for the scene when Private Ryan refuses to go home after the news his brothers have died. He allows himself to feel sorry just for a moment, until he decides that it is more important for him to stay in France and continue fighting until the job is done. Throughout the war, Americans never faltered in their efforts to win the war, no matter what was thrown at him, and this movie reiterates that …show more content…

The film graphically brings the horrors of World War II to life and how much it can impact the people who were a part of it. For example, when Private Caparzo died, played by Vin Diesel, I started to tear up, because he was one of my favorite characters and I wanted him to survive until the very end. However, he died in a brutish way, right after he tried to save a young child from the war zone. Yet, in this film, the viewer understands that people die, they don’t live because they are a fan favorite, they live because they were the ones who killed the other guy first. I would also recommend this film to people who want to gain a better understanding of World War II because it shows how much the war changed people. Throughout the entirety of the film, T/5 Timothy Upham protests the killing of anyone, and whenever the eight men went into battle, he sat on the sidelines, or helps the other men fighting by carrying ammo to them. But, in the final scene of the movie, he becomes enraged at the death of Captain Miller that he shoots and kills the German soldier who had killed him. This moment shows how even the people who protested the most about killing people were driven to kill others themselves. Finally, the film lets the viewer witness how bloody and gruesome the war actually was. Spielberg didn’t shy away from showing intestines

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