Saving Private Ryan

¶ … Saving Private Ryan" and "Casualties of War" -- a Contrast of Two Wars

In our nation's history, there are no two more different wars than World War II and Vietnam. Our memories of World War II seem to be full of heroes, and the enemy was clearly evil. Heroes acted honorably and vanquished the enemy. It was easy to determine who won and lost a battle -- and the war. Our Vietnam experience is not so clear-cut. The heroes were not those who won battles, but informed on fellow soldiers about atrocities. Wars are never clean, but Vietnam was a particularly dirty little war.

Saving Private Ryan is a 1998 film directed by Steven Spielberg and written by Robert Rodat, dealing with the World War II Battle of Normandy. The film is particularly notable for the intensity of the scenes in its first twenty minutes or so, which depict the Omaha beachhead assault of June 6, 1944. Thereafter it takes a very heavily fictionalized route built around the search for a particular member of the United States 101st Airborne Division. The general plot of the film, as the title suggests, is a humanitarian rescue mission led by John Miller, an army captain, played by Tom Hanks, to return the last surviving Ryan brother from the Normandy front line to his mother. "You can feel Capt. Miller fighting to maintain his humanity while often giving in to his blinding fear and anger. Sometimes he makes the wrong decision, but then you have to deal with the question of exactly what the 'right' decision is when you're in the middle of a situation in which concepts like right and wrong don't apply."

The bond between Miller and his men is forged in the beachhead assault on a German bunker, where his decisive action saved the day. As the position consolidates, Miller is given his new assignment, to find a certain Private James Francis Ryan (Matt Damon), who had been parachuted in as a member of the 101st Airborne, which, as the film historically correctly asserts, was scattered widely across Normandy. Ryan is the sole surviving member of four brothers, the other three having been killed in action. The American command takes the decision to bring him back for his mother's sake. Miller is somewhat conflicted by the effort to save one man. As he says when talking about it, "He better be worth it. He better go home and cure a disease, or invent a longer-lasting light bulb."

Miller conceals his erstwhile profession of schoolteacher and his background from the troops under his command; the uncovering of Miller's background becomes a sub-plot of the film in as much as the men have a monetary pool on his origins, which he steadfastly refuses to reveal. Under intensely difficult circumstances, Miller displays a decisive and courageous manner to his soldiers.

Eventually, at the expense of two members of their unit, Miller and his men catch up with Ryan. They break the news of his brothers' deaths to him and tell him that he is going home. Ryan is reluctant to go and decides not to desert his strategically important post.

Sergeant Horvath (Sizemore): I don't know. Part of me thinks the kid's right. He asks what he's done to deserve this. He wants to stay here, fine. Let's leave him and go home. But then another part of me thinks, what if by some miracle we stay, then actually make it out of here. Someday we might look back on this and decide that saving Private Ryan was the one decent thing we were able to pull out of this whole godawful mess. Like you said, Captain, maybe we do that, we all earn the right to go home.

Miller and his men protect him, and all but two members of the unit are killed in a ferocious German tank assault on the bridge over the Merderet River in the fictional village of Ramelle, which they are defending. Ryan survives, but Miller is killed in the assault.