Letters

SAVING PRIVATE RYAN

DEAR EDITOR:
Re: Ella Taylor's review of Saving Private Ryan ["Dark Victory," July 24-30]. It is not a "burst of schmaltzy ritual" when the old man falls to his knees at the cemetery in Normandy and asks his wife to tell him that he was a "good man." I traveled to Normandy in 1994 with veterans of the European campaign. There has not been one day since the war that the veterans of Omaha Beach have not thought of June 6, 1944. That "longest day" has lasted 54 years for them, and will last to the end of their lives.

In the first 30 minutes of his movie, Steven Spielberg finally tells America what really happened at Omaha Beach. Our fathers and grandfathers did not tell us. They could not. What happened there was too horrible for them to tell. It could only be remembered through ritual. The veterans in 1994 performed many rituals, including the kind filmed at the cemetery for the end of Saving Private Ryan. For those who survived Omaha Beach, it is only natural to think, "Why me?" "Have I lived as good a life as my buddy who was killed would have lived?" "Am I a good man?" If any veteran of that campaign is reading this letter, let me tell him: "You are a good man. Your life has been worthwhile."

-W. Roger Scott
Los Angeles

DEAR EDITOR:
I just read Ella Taylor's review of the film Saving Private Ryan. I found the movie to be - without question - the best and most realistic depiction of war I have ever seen. (So did my father, who is a Vietnam veteran who saw combat and was wounded in that war.) Many people in the audience came out crying, and during many of the battle scenes I saw people in the audience physically flinching and ducking down into their seats to avoid the bullets and shrapnel flying all around on the screen.

Taylor criticizes the dialogue - and virtually the entire story outside of the battle scenes. What, may I ask, is wrong with "sinking knee deep into the heroic individualism which defines American Romantic aspiration"? Of any war in the history of mankind, World War II was the one that, once started, absolutely had to be fought and won. The men and women who fought that war deserve recognition and our eternal appreciation, and the film shows just how enormous that sacrifice was. I don't think there is anything wrong in romanticizing the collective and individual sacrifices that were made to win World War II.

Taylor criticizes the final scene, in which one of the survivors, now an old man, falls to his knees before a cross in the American cemetery at Normandy. Does Taylor believe that such a scene would not happen in real life? I guess Taylor has never been to the Vietnam Memorial Wall and seen the veterans breaking down in front of that monument. That scene was not a "schmaltzy ritual," but based on reality.

-Richard Hudson
Los Angeles

DEAR EDITOR:
I am a 54-year-old Vietnam veteran. My wife and I went to Lake Charles this afternoon to see Saving Private Ryan. I entered the theater a little skeptical. (I have probably seen every World War II movie ever made.) I left the theater absolutely convinced that Saving Private Ryan is the best World War II movie of all time. Anyone who has ever been in the military, who has ever lost a friend or family member in military conflict, will very likely be moved as I was.

I am not normally given to recommending movies, but this work warrants such a recommendation.

-Ashley Waters
DeRidder, Louisiana

DEAR EDITOR:
My father was at Normandy. I am a Vietnam veteran and unashamedly wept at the Wall as I remembered and honored my fallen comrades. They made the ultimate sacrifice so that people like Ella Taylor - who doesn't have a clue as to what I'm talking about - can write an inadequate movie review.

I am totally at variance with 99 percent of Mr. Spielberg's publicly held political views, but one must give him his due: This time he got it right. Your reviewer didn't.

- R.D. Hart
Los Angeles

DEAR EDITOR:
Saving Private Ryan is a movie that strikes at the heart of war, that vividly portrays life in the ugly lane. Ms. Taylor should perhaps research her subject a little more carefully before putting pen to paper. This is war, ma'am, in all its terrible reality. Try it if you don't believe it.

-D. Moll
Houston, Texas

DEAR EDITOR:
Bravo to Ella Taylor for her review of Saving Private Ryan. For weeks now we have been subjected to Hollywood telling us how "honest" and "authentic" this movie is. At times, the hype has risen to such levels as to have us believe that Saving Private Ryan is the only honest or accurate war film ever made. And now we have Steven Spielberg on a road trip across America saying that he made this a film to tell the "truth" about World War II. What? Everyone else - Sam Fuller in The Big Red One, Sam Peckinpah in Cross of Iron, Cornel Wilde in Beach Red, Bernhard Wicki in The Bridge, to name just four examples - was lying about it?