When Steven Spielberg’s World War II drama “Saving Private Ryan” with Tom Hanks, Matt Damon and Vin Diesel appeared in the cinemas in 1998, the intensive opening scene in particular did not make it easy for the cinema audience. Spielberg recreates the Allied landings on Omaha Beach in Normandy in a very realistic way – it’s damned, it’s cruel, it’s just war.
The famous sequence is really unbearable, and it even solved the theatrical release of Saving Private Ryan Take care of the mental health of war veterans the end. Anyone who has had personal experience on a battlefield can be traumatized by the battle scenes recreated so realistically and accurately.
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In an article by confirmed War veteran John Raaen, who survived the so-called D-Day on June 6, 1944, felt that the film portrayed the events at Omaha Beach “very well”. and left him speechless:
“I remember walking into the cinema lobby after the screening and no one who had just seen the film said a word. Everyone was overwhelmed. I was too. I couldn’t talk to anyone either. It just brought back so many memories that your mind replayed all the things that had happened to you.
“Saving Private Ryan”: Not a euphemism
And Dominic Geraci, the medic who treated the wounded on D-Day, also confirms that Steven Spielberg’s account of the gruesome events was “100% accurate”: “There was no Hollywood euphemism.”
To care for war veterans whose post-traumatic stress disorder was caused by Saving Private Ryan, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs has even set up a dedicated hotline. The ministry is said to have received significantly more calls after the release of the film than before.
In an article by Deborah Richter, a therapist at the Portland Veterans Center at the time, said of the hotline’s creation, “I think the movie will hit a lot of people hard. John Wayne has made many films about the experience of World War II, but it is not depicted graphically in the way this film is intended. It’s a completely different perspective on the pain, the suffering and the actual murders.”
“It’s the ultimate trigger for post-traumatic experiences,” Richter continued, calling the advice hotline the ideal forum to find help.
Saving Private Ryan, a masterpiece of anti-war cinema, was nominated for eleven Oscars, eventually winning five: Best Director, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, Best Sound, Best Sound Editing. In the FILMSTARTS rating, there are the full 5 out of 5 possible stars.