When Steven Spielberg released the 1998 World War II epic Saving Private Ryan in 1998, audiences worldwide were experiencing one of cinema’s firsts. Using a strong sense of realism, Spielberg transported everyone to 1944 and made everybody a witness to the horrors of war in ways that no director in Hollywood had ever attempted to.

Sure, it wasn’t Spielberg’s first foray into the territory of war films, as five years prior he had accomplished a masterpiece in the form of Schindler’s List. But that film portrayed the insides of war from the perspective of the Holocaust victims. The military aspect was kept minor and was only on-screen when Nazi officials entered the pictures. The allies existed only as an idea. Saving Private Ryan was the director’s way to unveil the humanity of the other side, and contrary to what people still think, it is not a film that redeems heroes. Instead, it’s a jarring reflection of the human element when subjected to extreme measures.

In Saving Private Ryan, Captain John H. Miller and some soldiers in his crew barely survive the Normandy invasion. Scarred, both physically and emotionally, they find themselves forced to accept a mission that’s honorable but hard to understand from a strategic point of view. They came to fight the Nazis and win the war, but instead, Miller is appointed to find the last of the Ryan brothers. All the other three Ryans have been killed in combat, and ranking officers decide he must be extracted and brought back home safely. They simply don’t want his mother to lose all her sons.

Saving Private Ryan Release Date July 24, 1998 Cast Tom Hanks, Tom Sizemore, Edward Burns, Barry Pepper, Adam Goldberg, Vin Diesel Rating R Main Genre Action Director Steven Spielberg Runtime 169

Thus begins the journey of a group of soldiers whose faith lies in their leader. Miller, Horvath, Reiben, Caparzo, Mellish, Jackson, Wade, and interpreter Upham, have blind faith that Ryan will be found alive. Of course, not everyone is happy with this decision, as their mission is still a dangerous trek through Nazi-infested France.

On its 25th anniversary, it’s time for a rewatch and a celebration of the film. Saving Private Ryan is a fantastic exercise in the genre by Spielberg, which blew people’s minds back then and still feels like a milestone in war films that dared to show the reality of conflict with no sugarcoating of any kind. But is it actually the best war film ever made? Let’s find out.

The Raw Side of War
DreamWorks Pictures / Paramount Pictures

The film’s pivotal scene is its 25-minute introduction scene, in which Miller and the others arrive at Omaha Beach, where they’re supposed to storm the Nazis who wait for them on the shore. The tension is palpable for seconds, and then, when the boat doors are lowered, we become witnesses to the carnage that is war.

Spielberg gets rid of the steady cam and instead puts us in battle from a first-person perspective. Chunks of flesh fly out, and gore and guts are washed off by the sea. Miller stares in shock at something we can’t see. In a riveting “Spielberg stare” moment, we come to notice all his experience fading off, as no human being can ever come out alive from a moment like this one. He gets sprayed with blood, and that’s his wake-up call.

What follows is a masterclass in editing, sound design, and special effects. Spielberg designs the Omaha Beach scene with an ulterior motive to shock and provide a sample of what war actually was. Still in shock, audiences were supposed to continue on with a story that needed hope to function, and it seemed impossible. But somehow, he makes it.

However, Saving Private Ryan always works under the concept of gritty realism, and this doesn’t only involve graphic violence. Character development is forced under the honor badge of soldiers who didn’t connect with the war they had to fight. Additionally, they were forced to risk their lives because of another stranger, whose only punishment would be a spanking and a ticket home.

Related: 15 Best World War One Movies of All Time, Ranked

A Truly Compelling Story
DreamWorks Pictures / Paramount Pictures

The film’s a masterpiece from a technical point of view, and Spielberg could have easily sat in his comfort zone and made an emotionally void film. It would still have been extremely successful. However, he developed the idea from the very beginning and always intended on twisting the wheel of everyone’s opinion about war. Saving Private Ryan is heavily dramatic and poignant. He didn’t want to make a hopeful film and instead went for a compelling study on the terror of conflict. At least, it was his initial approach, and it was exactly the audience’s first bite.

What follows after the group is consolidated is a breakdown of all the preconceptions audiences had about war. History was light on the details, and Spielberg used Robert Rodat’s carefully curated script to make a film that expanded on the nihilism that was naturally born out of the situation. Miller is always a cold-headed leader, but his men are allowed to express themselves about the cynicism of their mission. In this continuous discussion about why Ryan’s life is more worthy than the others, the conflict of Saving Private Ryan shows its true face.

Kindness comes in strange forms. And honor isn’t exactly part of your persona when facing the chaos of inexplicable conflict. As bullets whiz by them, the last thing they think about is their nation. The only thing they have is each other, and that’s exactly what gets discarded, one soldier at a time. This is a very emotional aspect of the film, and it’s visible in the film’s emotional turning points.

Those Memorable Performances
DreamWorks Pictures / Paramount Pictures

Without its characters and the performers behind them, Saving Private Ryan wouldn’t have been as effective. It’s a character-driven war film that concedes startling points of filmmaking wizardry, but the reality is that it’s all about performances. The carefully planned casting process for the film let Spielberg use his usual method of casting relatively unknown actors so that audiences didn’t think of their previous performances.

Tom Hanks (in one of the best performances in Spielberg’s catalog), Tom Sizemore, Edward Burns, Matt Damon, Barry Pepper, Vin Diesel, Giovanni Ribisi, Adam Goldberg, and Jeremy Davies, among others, are the performers who give life to the soldiers going through the ordeal of the battle. For preparation purposes, they were all forced to participate in a six-day military boot camp, so they could experience things that they could use for their performances. It was so extreme that most of them wanted to quit, but Hanks kept them in line. Spielberg didn’t let Damon participate because he felt the actors needed to resent the actor because he played the character of Ryan.

Related: The Best War Miniseries of All Time, Ranked

Steven Spielberg at His Best
DreamWorks Pictures / Paramount Pictures

On Oscar night in 1999, Spielberg won his second Oscar for his work as director of Saving Private Ryan. Whoever bet against him clearly didn’t see the film first, given how great the film was directed and how deserved the Oscar was. The film’s a piece of superb directing in every detail. Not because you can feel you’re in Spielberg territory, but because of how difficult the film feels as an audiovisual chronicle.

Saving Private Ryan is, without question, a formidable document of war that doesn’t whitewash anything to make history friendly, and it doesn’t hide the fact that humanity isn’t an inherent part of the reaction. Sometimes we are animals because that’s the way we’re supposed to face animalistic behavior, and Spielberg shows this as a theme of the film and not as part of the story. You just have to dig deep into the dynamics of the conflict (and its third act, which complies with the resolution) to find the message that’s being addressed in one of Spielberg’s best films.

The best war film ever made? Perhaps. What we’re sure of is that Spielberg proved in the prime of his career that he could be a pioneer at something. And that something is the reality of something that’s inherently part of our evolution. We have been desensitized by how connected we are in today’s world and all the access we have to that which is forbidden. But Saving Private Ryan is still capable of making everyone flinch, and while that isn’t the legacy Spielberg sought, it’s part of a reality that was never reflected by other filmmakers.

The irony of it all is that if there’s a film that could compete against Saving Private Ryan for the top spot, that would be Spielberg’s own Schindler’s List.

To stay in the mood of Steven Spielberg’s war masterpiece, here’s a video of MovieWeb’s Best World War II Movies Ever Made:

You can stream Saving Private Ryan on Netflix or Paramount+.