aving Private Ryan’ Coursework
Spielberg generates the most powerful response during the opening scenes of ‘Saving Private Ryan’, an American 1998 war film, through many different techniques; imagery, sound effects, the structure of the movie and the lack of dialogue where some of the main aspects.
Imagery throughout the first scene is amazing; the starting point shows the most silent graveyard in beautiful surroundings. As Private Ryan, now an old man, enters the scene, the chilling silence continues, which doesn’t reflect his guilt, remembrance and inner torture; cutting us off from what’s actually on his mind.
As the silence becomes more obvious, Ryan bends to look at one of the stones. His family, who gather behind him, are also in silence; showing realism. What would you say if you where visiting a graveyard with a grown man breaking down in front of you? The silence adds realism, and the oblivion towards the mans feelings adds effect.
Ryan is then reduced to tears, and the scene becomes immensely powerful and emotional, as its rare to see a ‘grown man cry’. Camera work throughout the scene also adds power; as the man begins to fill with tears, the eyes become the focus of the scene, and quite roughly, the silence is killed by the fearful sound of waves. The originality and abnormality make this scene extremely powerful.
Soon, the waves become visible, and we finally see inside of Ryan’s mind and loose our imagination. The transaction to the waves and storm of the sea provoke many strong emotions; like the fighters in the war, we’re quickly forced into the battle ground. These scenes are powerful to many, more so the viewers who actually fought in the second world war.
During the moments of men leaving the boats to risk their lives, you experience a fear that you don’t get from other world war movies created in the past; for example, ‘Longest Day’.
War scenes in he ‘Longest Day’ movie are very half-hearted and tidy. Randomly, bodies fall to the floor and don’t make any mess. Also, the fighters don’t show much fear and emotion, making the view feel less connected and the portrayal less realistic.
In contrast, ‘Saving Private Ryan’. Men fall to the floor in all directions after large gun-shots are heard through the immensely powerful surround sound; members of the cinema experienced the most disturbing feeling of the sound of a bullet flying
past their heads, men falling to the floor on the screen in front of them. The portrayal of this movie are so much stronger than those of ‘Longest Day’; the men are praying for their lives to be saved, vomiting in worry and from sea-sickness and shaking from the sheer fear of what’s ahead; we’re let into the lives of the war-fighters, while the other movie shows no emotional connections between fighters and the audience.
The sound of under-water bullets and the shots of the landing craft opening in-front of them, letting out the men are also very effective; they are shown, along with other things, in a very structured and detailed order.
The final element which makes ‘Saving Private Ryan’ so powerful is the lack of dialogue; unlike other movies, the action of the war, and silence closer to the start, take over the words.
The film was thought through so brilliantly, it didn’t need to rely on words.
It is obvious that Spielberg created an incredible, unbeatable movie, and that powerful opening made it even more special.
Saving Private Ryan
“Saving Private Ryan”
Analyse the methods use to make the opening battle sequence of “Saving Private Ryan” both shocking and realistic and say how effective you find it as an introduction to the film
“Saving Private Ryan” is a war film directed by the well-known Jewish director Steven Spielberg and was released on September 11th 1998. It was a joint production with Paramount and DreamWorks pictures. The film won in total 5 Academy Awards (Oscars) including best director in 1999. This is most likely due to Spielberg’s many conventions used in the opening twenty-five minutes.
Saving Private Ryan’ broke traditional conventions of the war film genre, mainly because Spielberg used a very wide range of techniques, to portray what he wanted the audience to witness. He uses de-saturated colour all the way throughout the film, which gives off a dull, and washed out impression of the film and made the red of the blood stand out against the dull background. Another technique used was in the use of a handheld camera which made it seem like you were facing all the dangers the soldiers were faced, and seeing all the horrific things they saw from their point of view. These two techniques helped Spielberg achieve “realism at all times” . meaning that he would not hold back on any blood and gore that he wished to include in his film. One such time in the opening twenty-five minutes was during “Captain Millers confusion” where a soldier has his arm missing and in all the confusion is searching for his missing arm on the floor and when he eventually find it he just walks off as if nothing has happened. This shows the gory side to war but at the same time the effects it had on the people involved and how confused a man must be to search on a beach for his arm when bullets are flying in from left, right and centre.
In the opening scene, before we see any actors we are shown a full screen shot of the America flag accompanied by the sound of bugle playing in the background. The...
The boats the soldiers arrive on are dull and create an air of foreboding, almost like a purgatory for the hell that awaits them. As soon as the doors open you see this hell: a dark, desolate seascape filled with jagged metal crosses. Bullets rain down creating a real atmosphere as sand and blood flies everywhere blocking soldiers' vision and ultimately killing them. The grey bunkers that the bullets rain down from are like the devil's henchmen punishing the sinners. These crosses could be compared to the crosses In the first scene, like a warped, evil version of them that can lead to the comparison of the first scene and heaven; this is effective at showing the...
Speilburgs film
Jaws (1975)
E.T (1982)
Jurassic Park (1993)
Schindler's List (1993)
Artificial Intelligence: AI (1997)
Minority Report (2002)
Spielberg used variety of camera shots including close up, medium
shot, long shot, wide-angle shot and high angle shot. He used the hand
held camera which gives a great effect when the soldiers are
frantically clambering up Omaha beach. He makes the viewer experience
the struggling of the solders by using variety of camera shots. His
use of a basic inexpensive tool such as a video cam helps him to
achieve an almost documentary accuracy. All this helped to increase
the sense of realism and