Analysis Of Saving Private Ryan
When Steven Spielberg created Saving Private Ryan, his goal was to portray the terrors and triumphs of D-Day as more than just make-believe. Alongside praise from audiences and critics alike, actual World War II veterans also viewed the film as the most realistic exhibition of combat they have seen. Saving Private Ryan, truly captures the intimate and emotional experiences of World War II by effectively portraying both historical truths as well as familiar fictional realities, exposing future generations to the brutalities and raw realities soldiers experienced, while fighting for their country, in World War II. Saving Private Ryan was created to affect people by showing them the true nature of war for the first time. Within the film, it was the on shores of Normandy and the events of D-Day that Spielberg chose to intimately focus on and explore.
According to Spielberg, "Vietnam pushed people from his generation to tell the truth about war without …show more content…
glorifying it." This explains Spielberg’s desire to create the most realistic depictions of battle ever captured on film. Saving Private Ryan does not commemorate the war in any glamorous or desirable way. Instead, it memorializes the veterans and troops who fought in World War II. With a strong dedication to create realistic combat scenes, Spielberg required all his actors, except Matt Damon, to attend a two-week boot camp, simulating the conditions of the actual war. Spielberg’s desire to recreate the war experience for the actors is highly specific to the 1990s, a period in which the current generation of actors would never experience the horrors of combat in real life. In the 1950s, an "after the fact" perspective took hold of war films. Then in the 1960s, the war genre was a celebration of World War II victories. Filmmakers in the 1970s watched as Vietnam took hold and the war films tended to reflect disillusionment more than anything. Despite half a century having passed since World War II, the 1990s proved that the war had not disappeared from the American landscape. With cable and satellite television programming on the rise, images and stories from the war can be found any time, day or night, on television. The classic war films that were made in the 1950s and 1960s rotate through the stations weekly, reminding directors like Spielberg, who had watched combat films as boys, of their desire to make their own. Most importantly, Saving Private Ryan was made under the looming new millennium.
With the 50th anniversary of D-Day just around the corner, Robert Rodat began writing the screenplay for Saving Private Ryan. Along with Rodat, Spielberg was reflecting upon the past century, acknowledging World War II as the most significant event of the last 100 years. As the year 2000 approached, there was no better time for audiences to reflect and ask themselves "Did I earn this?" as the older Private Ryan does at the end of the film. Presented with realistic and brutal carnage, conveyed through sympathetic and recognizable characters, the film reminds modern audiences that war is something to be avoided. Saving Private Ryan stands as perhaps one of the last great World War II films that actual World War II veterans will get to see, relieving their own memories of war. Saving Private Ryan is nostalgic and memorializes what is recognized in our nation as the last great generation that willing fought and died with pride for our
country.
According to Spielberg, "Vietnam pushed people from his generation to tell the truth about war without …show more content…
glorifying it." This explains Spielberg’s desire to create the most realistic depictions of battle ever captured on film. Saving Private Ryan does not commemorate the war in any glamorous or desirable way. Instead, it memorializes the veterans and troops who fought in World War II. With a strong dedication to create realistic combat scenes, Spielberg required all his actors, except Matt Damon, to attend a two-week boot camp, simulating the conditions of the actual war. Spielberg’s desire to recreate the war experience for the actors is highly specific to the 1990s, a period in which the current generation of actors would never experience the horrors of combat in real life. In the 1950s, an "after the fact" perspective took hold of war films. Then in the 1960s, the war genre was a celebration of World War II victories. Filmmakers in the 1970s watched as Vietnam took hold and the war films tended to reflect disillusionment more than anything. Despite half a century having passed since World War II, the 1990s proved that the war had not disappeared from the American landscape. With cable and satellite television programming on the rise, images and stories from the war can be found any time, day or night, on television. The classic war films that were made in the 1950s and 1960s rotate through the stations weekly, reminding directors like Spielberg, who had watched combat films as boys, of their desire to make their own. Most importantly, Saving Private Ryan was made under the looming new millennium.
With the 50th anniversary of D-Day just around the corner, Robert Rodat began writing the screenplay for Saving Private Ryan. Along with Rodat, Spielberg was reflecting upon the past century, acknowledging World War II as the most significant event of the last 100 years. As the year 2000 approached, there was no better time for audiences to reflect and ask themselves "Did I earn this?" as the older Private Ryan does at the end of the film. Presented with realistic and brutal carnage, conveyed through sympathetic and recognizable characters, the film reminds modern audiences that war is something to be avoided. Saving Private Ryan stands as perhaps one of the last great World War II films that actual World War II veterans will get to see, relieving their own memories of war. Saving Private Ryan is nostalgic and memorializes what is recognized in our nation as the last great generation that willing fought and died with pride for our
country.