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In Reply to: "Saving Private Ryan" posted by rico on November 13, 2004 at 10:35:28:
The opening and closing scenes - the monkey walk sequences - are among the most ineptly done in history.The landing scene is pure playing on emotions with no art thrown in... all done in very poor taste with barrels of red paint needlessly wasted. I hope it didn't get any greens up in arms.
The rest of it is simply idiotic. The basic plot and the pukily-sentimental kaka and overcooked kasha spread all over the clean table cloth (borrowing the famous critic's phrase).
It is real shame that movie was made and promoted as it was.
Just my 2 rubles... as they say.
Follow Ups:
The opening and closing scenes--the aged Ryan visiting the memorial--is enept and cloying and misleading, since it opens by suggesting that this old veteran had been among those whom we soon watch storming the beach on D-Day (Ryan was dropped behind enemy lines). This is typical late Spielberg and quite unfortunate.I disagree with your assessment of the landing scene. It's perfectly gritty and visceral not only visually but in terms of the sound editing (I've talked to vets who were equally impressed with the film's actually having captured what it sounds like when a body's hit by a bullet) and quite arful for that. The rest of the film, with few minor exceptions, is an exercise in war-film formulism. The first twenty minutes make, in my opinion, one of the most potent anti-war statements available simply for showing rather than, as The Thin Red Line tried to do, telling. The rest of the film undermines that, if that doesn't undermine the valor and jingoism of the rest of the film.
If we didn't have those bookends we wouldn't get to see that delicious blond in the blue sweateer with the huge bust.
...that the good guys saved from Gestapo and who then followed them to the end. A minor plot rearrangment would be well within Spielberg's capabilities, and would boost the revenues by a sizable amount.After all, many vets would remember their nurse in the field hospital. I know my father-in-law always rolls his eyes when mentioning one Polish nurse...
Talk about truth to the subject.
Please see my reply to sjb on the issue of realism versus artistism - we are all lucky when they happen at the same time - those events are quite rare. I have no doubt that the Normandy vets would be moved by that sequence.You hit it right with that "formulism" word.
Maybe I'm missing something, but I feel like you're knocking it almost a priori for its content on the basis that Normandy battle-vets are liable to be moved by it a priori for its content. I sympathize with this prejudice to an extent: extremes too often earn quick and easy praise. Actor's who play, for example, retards almost always turn in, in my opinion, meretritious performances, while those successfully creating nuanced, three-dimensional characters get overlooked in favor of the former. So, yeah, Big Battles designate Serious and Important Work, often regardless of their real cinematic merits. But surely there will be attempts at depicting what it's like to be in the thick of battle that fail and attempts that succeed (whether the viewer was there or not). How would you have done Spielberg's Omaha Beach sequence differently from a stylistic standpoint and why? I'm curious.
If I may interject...One way to show the horror without graphic detail, is to show it in the eyes of the survivors, and in the way they interact with each other after the battle, and how they interact with their (new) reality. Of course, that has been done before with varying degrees of success by other directors, so Spielberg would have had to be creative to come up with his own way of doing it - something that he seems incapable of.
Actually, the famous beach scene just raises the bar for the next guy, to make such scenes even MORE realistic, and thereby de-sensitizing the audience to such scenes.
In Vino Veritas
***Maybe I'm missing something, but I feel like you're knocking it almost a priori for its content on the basis that Normandy battle-vets are liable to be moved by it a priori for its content.Not at all. I am 'knocking' if you will the attempts at using the vet's reaction as some proof of film's quality. As I said, that reaction has more to do with the history and events rather than the way it is being portrayed. When it comes to events to which we have strong emotional attachment the artistic means almost don't matter, as long as they are within reason.
How would I do it I don't know. I guess that is why I am not a script writer or director. But I have seen enough films to know it can be done differently, and most importantly, it concerns the ways in which the horrors are related.
Yes, when the bullet hits the body we all react. But many great directors have been able to convey the shock, the horror, the fear, etc, without actually resorting to plastic guts and red paint.
I am pulling this at random, but for instance the final scene of Gallipoli has as much grip and horror, yet there is no actual bullets and open wounds. And somehow it becomes more effective.
...showing horror without showing horror is art. Showing horrir by showing horror is artisanship.Often it is the anticipation of horror that is much more horryfying than the very act of violence. Spielberg is unable to do that, he needs to show the actual act.
Esp. with the Gallipoli reference, but I think there's something about the sanitization of violence in film--a problem I think in a lot of ways retroactively exposed by the first twenty minutes of SPR--is a real problem, specifically in cases in which, as a matter of content, violence can't be avoided. For example: the storming of Omaha Beach. I think most film deaths elide something essential to the experience of loss by almost always letting us somehow say our goodbyes. When a hero or even just some minor character or friend or foil is killed, there's always some kind of looking into the camera, a conscious recognition of impending death on the actor's face, some kind of communion between the departing and the soon-to-be-berieved. Rarely dead and that's it. No goodbyes. The shock of authentic-looking violence in SPR--of violence done to the human body, the destruction often so complete that, if there's any thing left to say goodbye to, it's still been mangled and distorted beyond recognition--I think comes closer, above and beyond the gore, to presenting the reel sensory violence of loss than any other war film I've seen, Gallipoli included (though Gallipoli is far and away the superior film--again, I'm talking specifically about how Spielberg rendered the storming of Omaha Beach).But in other scenarios, delicacy is best. The murder of the son in In the Bedroom, for example. You're with the girlfriend when she hear's the gunshot, not with the victim when he receives it, which is exactly the right move, as the victim's experience, given that he's killed, isn't a viable perspective through which to present that scene, as the dead don't live with experience and have nothing to say to us about how they died. As a movie about loss, it must be done from the perpective of the berieved, and the horror of that gunshot and the site of his lifeless body on the kitchen floor after, deformed and deprived of goodbyes, is powerfully affecting, and not the kind of move I'd ever expect from Spielberg, that's for sure.
Well, what you are saying makes sense, and perhaps I will re-watch the SPR's Omaha part to see if this is true... as I watched it last time I simply felt cheated, and the hair on my neck is usually good indicator - you know, you feel it without wasting words. All my reactions to it were negative, and I am a guy who loves battle scenes.I hope you don't ask me to watch the rest of that gem, though.
I need to watch Gallipoli again. It's been years.
You obviously missed the purpose of the Normandy invasion. The purpose was not to create "art", but to make you feel, as close as you can be without being shot at, as though you part of the battle. The testimony of the soldiers who were actually part of the invasion that the scene made them relive the experience is good enough for me. I have never seen a war film that made me appreciate the sacrifice of the of soldiers as did Saving Private Ryan". That is a good thing. That Speilberg was able to accomplish this feat when so many film makers have not is impressive.Maybe you are part of the European apologist camp that still smarts when confronted by the fact that the United States essentially brought freedom to mainland Europeans, and the film does not comport with your politics. We know you do not like Tarantino, so I would imagine that Spielberg represented Hollywood excess, so his work must therefore be dismissed out of hand as well.
Let me guess: "Schindler's List" was propaganda, and "Jaws" was cut rate horror.
You proffer your opinions, it is only fair you provide a little information, such as nationality, politics, etc., so that your opinions can be put in context.
And sappy. I got the DVD right after it was released and viewed it for the first time in many years. I was surprised that I found it so sappy. Yep, Speilberg is the master of emotion and he used it quite a bit. My memory had turned Schindler into a film for all time that should be shown in history classes as a good example of genocide. I was wrong---it's just a little too mushy. But, I feel that SPR didn't come close to the amount of sap used in Schindler.
( huh? )
***The testimony of the soldiers who were actually part of the invasion that the scene made them relive the experience is good enough for me. I have never seen a war film that made me appreciate the sacrifice of the of soldiers as did Saving Private Ryan".As I said... a shamless speculation on strong emotions. Spielberg is unfortunately good at that. I despise that.
Let's not argue here who brought freedom to Europe... let's just agree that was a mutual accomplishment. As far as me being a Euro apologist - tell it to those who know my from the Outside.
But being an American and and American patriot doesn't mean one has to swallow garbage, and SPR is such garbage at several levels. It is built on worn out cliche's and cheap effects - like that miraculous shot by our sniper. When the director feels the need for such idiotic measures you can be sure the movie can't stand on its own... and that one surely can't.
Yes, I consider Tarantino a wasted talent, but I am not sure what this has to do with SPR. And yes, Spielberg epitomizes what's wrong with Hollywood. In fact he is one of the most responsibe for its downfall.
Nationality? Not sure what it has to do with movie appreciation, but Russian-born American. A conservative.
The rest of the movie aside, I don't understand what it is you are protesting with the opening."The landing scene is pure playing on emotions with no art thrown in... all done in very poor taste with barrels of red paint needlessly wasted. I hope it didn't get any greens up in arms."
What on earth is "pure playing on emotions?" There was plenty of art that went into that sequence. The choices in shot selection, pacing, cinematic style, subject matter, and music were all artistic choices. Apparently they were quite effective since the goal of the artist was to take the viewer as close to the original experience as he possibly could and those who were there claim he was quite successful. What was done in "poor taste?" War and carnage are inherently terrible. Art and artists do not have to shy away from this subject to remain within the bounds of good taste. What specifically made this sequence distatseful? I must have missed the barrels of red paint. Where were they?
"***The testimony of the soldiers who were actually part of the invasion that the scene made them relive the experience is good enough for me. I have never seen a war film that made me appreciate the sacrifice of the of soldiers as did Saving Private Ryan".
As I said... a shamless speculation on strong emotions. Spielberg is unfortunately good at that. I despise that."I'm not sure what you mean by "shameless speculation on strong emotions." But art does often play upon strong emotions. It would seem that Spielberg's "speculation" on the events were well researched at the very least and played with some level of effective accuracy. But I'm not sure what you meant by "shameless speculation."
"a shamless speculation on strong emotions"I am not sure what this means. You mean that Spielberg "speculated" what the d-day invasion was like? If so, then you are wrong. He used actual soldiers who consulted, and the verdict redered by others that were actually there speaks volumes that he accomplished his goal. I was not there, neither were you. I'll defer to those that were there. Unless you feel that reading about it is the same as having lived it. To which I now served in Vietnam.
"let's just agree that was a mutual accomplishment"
Huh? The French government opened their arms to Germany. Other than the Soviet Union, which signed a non-agression pact with Germany, and the Nordic Countries that were "neutral", and England, European contries were largely missing. The Soviet Union entered the fray only because Hitler broke his agreement. And then most of the damage was done by the Russian Winter. There was a French underground, but that underground would not have freed occupied France if not for the United States. On the other hand, there is no doubt in my mind that the United States would have successfully freed France with, or without, the resistance. England certainly was a major contributor, but the bulk of the troops were American. And who fought Japan? They signed a treaty with Germany. Do not recall Europeans being involved in that conflict.
"It is built on worn out cliche's and cheap effects - like that miraculous shot by our sniper."
Hate to burst your bubble, but there were snipers during WWII that possessed incredible ability to make impossible shots (to you or me). They were largely loners, not being part of a "unit".
"Yes, I consider Tarantino a wasted talent, but I am not sure what this has to do with SPR."
Because there are some people, I might call them arrogant, that believe anything from Hollywood must be bad, and they look to films from Hollywood knowing that they will dislike it. As though their "taste" is too highbrow to enjoy anything from Hollywod. Analogous to those that think all audio equipment made in the Far East must be bad, and so they listen believing they should think it sounds bad.
I get the impression that you watch films from more of an "intellectual" level. Emotions at films bad? I watch films to learn, to feel empathy, happiness, sadness, joy, anger, and to experience and see places and things that I would not otherwise see. "Saving Private Ryan" provided me the closest experience I hopefully will ever have to war. It allowed me to appreciate their sacrifice. If you are so emotionally detached from the world at large that this "purpose" is meaningless, that films are merely an exercise, and you watch films merely to fulfill some "artistic" urge, then I am sorry you could not enjoy the rush of the opening invasion scene.
On "Atom films" site...
***"It is built on worn out cliche's and cheap effects - like that miraculous shot by our sniper."***Hate to burst your bubble, but there were snipers during WWII that possessed incredible ability to make impossible shots (to you or me). They were largely loners, not being part of a "unit".
Real life ain't Hollywood. I suggest you check the sniper rifle capabilities. Hint: it ain't even close to that shot. If you can't find it let me know and I will tell you.
When noted WW II historian Stephen Ambrose saw the final screening of Saving Private Ryan, he asked the projectionist to stop the film after the opening sequence on Omaha Beach. "I said, "I've got to catch my breath.' I felt as if I hadn't breathed in a half an hour. I walked up the stairs and down the stairs in the theater about 10 times. Finally I got myself composed and said, "OK, roll it!' "In Zanuck's The Longest Day the whole movie turns on this incident, with Robert Mitchum in the end encouraging a couple of lieutenants to get up there and get those torpedoes under that barbed wire and then get the TNT up to the antitank obstacles at the head of the ravines and blow them up.
And that happens as a climax in the movie, and Robert Mitchum says, "Let's go on up that hill," and it's like the cavalry to the rescue. Guys from all over the beach start yelling like banshees and start moving up that draw. It's a great movie scene, but nothing remotely like that ever happened in fact. What happened in fact was much more like what is in Saving Private Ryan. Those ravines were much too well-defended to get up. The tanks that the infantry were told were going to be coming in with them, beside them -- these swimming tanks, these Shermans that had the inflatable rubber skirts around them, 32 of the 35 of them sank. There was no way to get up the ravines, and the true story of what happened at Omaha was much more inspiring than the way Zanuck presented it.
The search for Private Ryan is fiction," says historian Stephen Ambrose, "but of the kind that illuminates truth rather than diminishing it."
As Miller’s squad moves inland to search for Private Ryan, they enter a decimated French village, where they encounter terrified French civilians and battle a German sniper; Ambrose notes that this is representative of the experiences of Allied forces as they moved off the beaches.
Well, a noted WWII historian, the Academy which awarded Spielberg an Academy Award for best director, and 97% of professional movie critics (including the New York Times, Time Magazine, the L.A. Times, and the Chicago Sun Times) v. Victor. Perhaps you missed your calling, as you are apparently able to see what these professionals failed to see. Or is it more likely they saw what you failed to see? I suspect that if the film was made by a French director, it would have been much better. But then, the French do not make many WWII films, do they? Wonder why. Rather, I suspect that your dislike for this film has more to do with your dislike of Spielberg and Hollywood that on the merit. Simply admit your lack of objectivity and more on.
If nine reviewers loved your amplifier, and one thought is sounded terrible, which opinion would you ask us to believe? Which would be the eccentric? Which opinion would probably be guided by motives other than finding merit? Thought so.
All you had to do was say "I have no idea".
Dodge? You wrote that the opening scene was among the most ineptly done in history. You wrote that the opening scene is a pure playing on emotions. You wrote that rest of the film is idiotic. Those statements contain only conclusions, no analysis. I supplied you with an opinion of a noted WWII historian that directly refutes your statements, and yet not nary a word either supporting your conclusions or disputing those of Ambrose. Dodge? You have failed to do anything but provide blanket statements unsupported by any intelligent analysis. Kaka? Where, pray tell, did you learn that descriptive word? Is that a word of art? What level of higher education did you pick up that little chestnut?You wrote that WWII was a mutual accomplishment. Well, I suspect that your version of history is about as accurate as your reviews.
If your opinion of this film was based on single shot performed by a sniper, then I suspect you probably do not enjoy films. Probably not music either. Well, the fact that there is no Oz does not prevent me from loving that film. Though, I suspect, even that film has too much sentimentality for you. You asked what your nationality has to do with your opinions? I do not think it a secret that people from different places, and from different backgrounds, receive the same stimuli differently. Russians have a reputation of viewing music and events from a view in which emotions are not an important factor. Having met and known several Russian people, my experience with them confirms this reputation.
Although they never used the word Kaka.
Have you listened to Russian composers, conductors and musicians? Read Russian poets?Clearly Victor, for whatever reason, is refusing to address the fact that WWII vets vouch for the veracity of the landing scene but you shouldn't let the frustration from that cause you to paint with too broad a brush.
"Where are we going? And what am I doing in this hand basket?"
"Have you listened to Russian composers, conductors and musicians? Read Russian poets?"Yes, yes, yes, and no. My comments did not apply to the creators of the arts, only the patrons. You know, the same people who look at a beautiful painting and spend time analyzing the lines. Or the people who listen to music as though they are listening to a seminar on brain surgery, and can talk about nothing other than the missed notes, or the "sound" of the performance, or the intricacies of the score. I doubt the great composers wrote their symphonies hoping against hope that all people would analyze were the notes.
My point was that it appears Victor spends more time analyzing and thinking about a film than simply enjoying the film. My experience with Russian (Soviet is probably more accurate) people that I have known confirms for me that they tend to be more analytical. Which is fine. My observations tell me they spend less time enjoying life.
But this viewpoint would lead one to miss the purpose of the opening scene in Ryan, which Victor clearly has missed. It was meant to be experienced, not analyzed. Could Spielberg have made it more "artsy?" Less gory? Maybe. But why? That was not his goal. His clearly stated goal was to place the viewer in the position of the soldier in the heat of battle on the beach of Normandy. Why? Because no filmmaker had ever done so before. Having never been there, I can only accept what those who have been there have said - that he succeeded.
Victor was asked how would have done it differently. Predicably, no response. If I told Victor how to design amplifiers, or how to make his amplifiers better, he would probably tell me I was full of "kaka". Which I would not presume to do. But then he expouses his film critism not with the intent of contributing to the dialog, or willing to appreciate other's viewpoints, but rather with the notion that his opinions are provided from on high.
The first rule of critism is to review the film that has been made, not the film you wish had been made. The only question in the opening scene is whether Spielberg acheived his goal. Which he did. Not whether the viewer wishes Spielberg had done it differently. It was done differently - that film is The Longest Day. But as Ambrose pointed out, the sound choices in that film were made so that the viewer could hear the actors, not the actual sound of battle. In addition, veterans tell us that very few people were actually shot in the heart, or killed by a single bullet. More frequently, soldiers actually had guts spilling out, were picking up body parts, etc, and died slowly. Too much blood and guts? Welcome to the real world.
We probably do not need to see such carnage. But I do believe that it is important for those of us (including Victor) who have benefitted from these soldiers sacrifices to actually know what they went through. If there is another medium which can place me closer, other than enlisting, let me know.
To Victor, theirs is a story to be made into "art", as though art cannot tell it to us like it is. Well, I have seen the "art", and it has not made me appreciate their sacrifice. I was very moved. Probably more so than I have ever been at any movie. I have only cried in one other movie. Oddly, I did not loose it at the movie, but when I got home and thought about what these solders went through. And that their deaths have allowed me to breathe the air I breathe. Victor thinks that is a bad thing. Because Spielberg showed me the way it is? Truth is stranger than fiction? Well, truth is also stronger than fiction.
Victor tell us that the opening sequence plays on emotions. Well, he has yet to identify what emotions he is referring to. And why is appealing to emotions a bad thing? Wizard of Oz appealed to emotions. And I am proud to say I love the film.
***Clearly Victor, for whatever reason, is refusing to address the fact that WWII vets vouch for the veracity of the landing sceneWell, the reason is quite simple, really, and it is that it has nothing to do with the film's merits.
This is what I meant by shamelessly speculating on strong emotions.
There are things that are rightly considered no-no's in making of fine movies. Showing a cute child or a dog are among them. And also - what Spielberg does.
Let me illustrate this with an example. Let's say I decided to make a movie depicting the life of a little Jewish girl, the last days of it, from the time her family was rounded up and to the gas chamber.
If I stayed reasonably close to the truth of the subject (would not be all that hard to do), I would know the film would stir **extremely** strong emotions in Holocaust survivers and members of their families. It would need not be any artistic revelation, just have no obvious irritating elements or serious faults - and it would grab the public' attention.
In fact, it might even assure a reasonable shot at Oscars.
Now, to make a movie that grabs the viewer by examiling a seemingly primitive, simple, small or insignificant subject is an entirely different matter. THAT takes a master.
Look at Nights of Cabiria. A few days in life of a low class Roman hooker. And Fellini manages to create the emotional masterpiece that can completely stand on its own feet, and will continue to do so for centuries, probably.
What Fellini does in that movie is completely absent in SPR. And one can conclude further that great masters most of the time avoided Earth shattering events in ther work, as these tend to overshadow the artistic, creative side of their work. And yes, there ARE a few exceptions. But mostly Chardins paited their self-portraits and their servant girls.
Great masters just don't speculate on strong emotions and cute kids. For that is truly Spielberg's territory, the land of a movie BUSINESSMAN, where he is the King. He started with showing teenagers being swallowed by shark, and apparently he never left that paradigm.
He most likely has reached the level of his incompetence. He will never give us another Bicycle Thief for the simple reason... that he can't.
Looks like the film forum isn't yer private kitty litter box
anymore.Gas bag.
YECH
?
Much better than " Ryan " which I agree with Victor is a bad film for many reasons, is " Band of Brothers ".
But that has all been already discussed here.
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