Saving Private Ryan Contradicts Hollywood's Perspective Of War

The movie Saving Private Ryan contradicts Hollywood’s perspective of war being something that is viewed as valiant, heroic, and admirable for the audiences. Instead it draws elements of grueling severity, vigorous realism, and demoralizing codification, making Saving Private Ryan a film that resonates with audiences not only in an impactful way, but also meant to bring about awareness during World War II’s depressing events and tragedies.

Steven Speilberg created the movie in 1998 and set it during the events of WWII, where Speilberg is known for similar works such as Schindler’s List and The Last Days. The plot focuses on Captain Miller, a simple English teacher born in Pennsylvania, and his unit of average war soldiers. The writer of the

Something also very admirable about the film is its dealings with his character. While Ryan’s still serving in the war, Captain Miller is instructed with a unit to return Ryan home after all his brothers were reported dead. When Miller first finds him Ryan’s adamant about staying with the rest of his troops at Ramelle France, because according to Ryan they were the only brothers he had left. Unfortunately, an intense battle ensues leaving all the troops dead. Therefore Ryan has no other choice, but to go with Captain Miller. The rest of the movie is Captain Miller and his unit protecting the life of the singular soldier. To Ryan this is tedious, disapproving over how a whole unit is sent to preserve a singular life, but in the scene where he’s a veteran and at Miller’s grave we now see how Ryan is truly grateful. In one of the first shots of the movie his character is first introduced as a war veteran knelt down and weeping at Captain Miller’s grave. This scene displays the immense trauma he went through as a soldier and how he developed into who he is now. As dedication to live up to Captain Miller, Ryan does good deeds out of penance, and tries his best to live a good life. Phil London, writer for Realism, Genre, and Saving Private Ryan, writes this beautifully describing Ryan’s characters with the quote, “have I been a good man?”(qtd 2). Captain Miller’s dying words to Ryan was, “James, earn this… Earn it”. It perfectly puts into perspective

What we know about Private Ryan is he serves as a significant role to the movie's plot point. Captain Miller and his eight men must find the sole surviving son and return him to America to complete the mission, but there’s more to this plot than meets the eye. In one of the scenes where Miller and his men meet with another unit to pick up Ryan, the camera isn’t initially pointed at his face and instead get a shot of him running up to meet the unit while we as the audience hear the surrounding soldiers whisper to each other things about him. What the movie is doing is essentially creating an element of mystery to build up our anticipation for Ryan’s character. It gives the audience a rising feeling of curiosity, but also expectation. It is only when it is later revealed that the soldier was not in fact Ryan that our expectations are subverted and suddenly we have a strong urge to find the real Ryan. Ryan’s character is becoming desired by the audience as someone they desperately want to find even though we already know we’re going to find him. However in the midst of all the death, gore, and depressing scenes, finding him has now come across as a glimpse of hope. It is because we were so conditioned by previous movies to be met with glorious and heroic outcomes that by simply finding a lost soldier in this movie will be a triumph to the