There is a scene in SAVING PRIVATE RYAN that shows a mother in her kitchen, washing the dishes while looking outside the window. In the speck of horizon, rolling along the golden fields was an army vehicle. As soon as she saw it, she gasped involuntarily and her eyes were steeled. The mother clutched her own hands as she rushed outside greeted by a sad look of the Army chief, and before the news came out of their mouths, she knew it as soon as she fall into her knees. She just lost three sons in the D-Day war.

It’s only one of the most haunting scenes this magnificent war film by classy auteur Steven Spielberg has to offer. SAVING PRIVATE RYAN, along with its compellingly realistic cinematography, intense musical sore, fine performances, and especially the monumental direction, is one of the best-made war films of all time. Shame it lost to love-romance flick SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE in the battle of Oscar Best Pic (one of Oscar history’s greatest Best Pic upset, reminiscent of BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN’s loss to CRASH).

This is a film about indelible, pure, unadulterated heroism. Even just the story itself is such a heroic depiction of courage and bravery. A band of soldiers were sent to save Pvt. Ryan by the Army Chief of Staff, the only one alive out of the killed Ryan brothers, to boost the morale of the army front and not to waste any more life that would put a mother into a disparaging grief. Eight men, as they grumbled “This Ryan better be worth it”, were seen to have families as well, putting their lives in great peril beyond enemy lines. These eight soldiers, as they marched into the battlefields, were reduced from being war machines into struggling, terrified humans being commanded to save another life.

Hands down for Spielberg for knowing his material by heart. Choosing Tom Hanks as the ex-teacher-turned-soldier Capt. Miller was a fine pursuit. He caricatures Miller as a soldier who knows his codes backwards yet gripped to the point where he loses his confidence when enemies fire guns in front of him; like any other human, like what Jack Nicholson said in his memorable line in THE DEPARTED “When we are facing a gun, what’s the difference?” Characters of humanity shares echoes in this film, examples of Matt Damon as Pvt. James Francis Ryan, Tom Sizemore as Sergeant Mike Horvath, Giovanni Ribisi as the medic Erwin Wade, and most of all, one of SAVING PRIVATE RYAN’s central depiction of human foolery, the translator-turned-warzone-combatant Timothy Upham played by an amazing performance by Jeremy Davies. It’s him that gives the tale about the loss of innocence in war. A typewriter-fastened laddie forced to join the search to help translate the language into Germans, a media person compelled to hold a gun for the sake of his life.

Hands down as well to cinematography Janusz Kaminski (who also brought us the black-and-white vista of the glorious SCHINDLER’S LIST), for bringing SAVING PRIVATE RYAN a realistic feel that made the prologue in Omaha Beach look like a horrifying, gritty news-reel. His pictures are dazzling, and truly impregnable. The battle in Omaha beach alone made this film transcends into the war genre and defined it more than it truly was in old war films.

In its own genre, it catapults into greatness. SAVING PRIVATE RYAN is great because it isn’t about just heroes marching to save an endangered life; it’s about humans, with the order brought upon them, a mission they would have to fulfil, to save another human’s life while saving their own necks as well. This is terrific, moving and unforgettable, cinema at its finest.

Rating: A+