The War Genre, Movie Review Example

The War Genre:  Saving Private Ryan vs. The Thin Red Line

Introduction

Saving Private Ryan was a block-buster war movie of epic proportions produced by the renowned Director Steven Spielberg. A big cast production starring Tom Hanks and Matt Damon. Released in 1998 it portrayed the D-Day landings in Europe and illustrated the soldier’s view of the bloody battle that ensued on the beaches of Normandy. A graphic account of the horrors of war, it contained one of the most graphic illustrations of a battle scene ever shown on film.  Whoever sees this film will never forget it and the powerful acting performances of Hanks and Damon.  The film was nominated for 5 Academy awards including that of Best Director for Spielberg.  Spielberg had made another powerful war film called Schindlers List but perhaps Saving Private Ryan was the greatest triumph in blending a heart wrenching story with the graphic horrors of war.

By contract the Thin Red Line was produced in the same year by Terrence Malick and had the same theme as Saving Private Ryan but had some different perspectives. This was filmed around the war in the Pacific and the invasion of Guadalcanal, held by the Japanese army. Again this portrayed a military landing on a beach and a subsequent assault of a hill top bunker, both films with scenes of graphic violence.  The main differential was that Spielberg focused upon the character of individuals where Malick examined spirit and determination. Saving Private Ryan was more of a reflective essay through the eyes of a Soldier (Private Ryan) looking back at the horrors of World War 2 and the Normandy Landings (D-Day).  Whereas in the Thin Red line it is more of a story that examines the spirit and determination of a number of characters facing a situation of extreme adversity.  It was remarkably told with great acting from Sean Penn and Woody Harrelson.

Saving private ryan analysis

The acting of the soldiers was extremely well done depicting the anxieties, the trauma of the men, the resilience of the men and their courage and dedication to duty. The film was extremely well researched and Spielberg does a great job in the direction of this film and makes you feel grateful to those brave soldiers who laid down their lives so that we may have the freedom that we enjoy today.  In some regards this is perhaps true of all soldiers who lay down their lives in service of their country.  This point is a question of scales and focuses upon the sheer number of soldiers that were killed in the D-Day landings. A point that is often lost is the amount of German fatalities in addition to the deaths of the allied forces. It was estimated that over 200,000 Germans were killed during this time.

The timing of the movie in 1998 co-incided with the war in Iraq in order to move Saddam Hussein from power.  It is not certain as to whether Spielberg was trying to make any political statement here.  The timing was however useful in terms of making people feel angry towards an enemy of the USA . The main objective of the film was to make the audience feel hostility towards the enemy.  As such this would have been a very arousing film to show audiences before the Gulf War commenced.   The question of balance was not really shown in the film and despite the heavily fortified beaches of Normandy and the terrible loss of allied lives, nevertheless the allied troops prevailed and inflicted a heavy loss on the Germans in terms of fatalities and numbers wounded.  Spielberg tends to gloss over this and focuses his main efforts on the contempt of the enemy and as such the story does portray bias towards the US soldiers.

Of the two films I preferred Saving Private Ryan, starring Tom Hanks.  Both are extremely good films and depict the sheer graphic horror of warfare.