Private Ryan 2 Essay, Research Paper

Saving Private Ryan

The movie Saving Private Ryan is about a group of American soldiers walking around in Europe during World War II. The objective of this mission is to find one man whose three brothers were killed and return that man back to his mom in America. Private Ryan and the rest of the airborne unit he was in were dropped all over the countryside of France. It is the job of Captain Miller and his company to find Private Ryan. They company searching for Private Ryan encounters many attacks from the Nazis.

This movie starts off pretty good with one of the largest battles in history. Many American soldiers died on the beach. The ones that survived were unfortunately put back into fighting with out any sort of break

This movie gave an excellent portrayal of World War II. It makes me think about what if this happened and I had been drafted into the war. The soldiers in the movie were all around my age bracket. Those were people my age fighting and dying for their country. If I was around for this war, I doubt I would have made it off the beach in the first scene.

The movie also tells about many different types of attitudes that the American boys had about the war and how they reacted to it. An example of this would be when the company took over a machine gun and one of their friends died from enemy fire. Several American soldiers were going to execute the Nazi until another soldier stopped them. Personally, I would have killed the Nazi soldier because he was involved in killing my friend. Even if the man killed were a complete stranger, but still an American, I would have still killed the Nazi.

The movie Saving Private Ryan also makes me respect what my grandfather and many other people s grandfathers had to do. They were enlisted while they were young men and sent off to a strange land. It is like leaving your family and everything you know to go away uncertain if you were to return alive or in a box.

When this movie first came to theatres, many World War II veterans had horrible flashbacks and had to leave the theatres, many of them in tears. This was nothing to laugh about. Something that horrible that it can leave deep emotional scars for over fifty years. As a person of my age and sex, I realize how horrible it must have been.

One thing I did not like about the movie, but I am sure it did happen was the Private Opum. He had a chance to save the life of his friend and potentially three other men. Instead he sat on a stairway and cried like a little baby. This makes me upset because I do not think that I would sit there and cry while there were guns going off all around me and my friend was being stabbed to death. I believe in that situation that I would have run up the stairs and shot the Nazi who was fighting with another American soldier.

Back to the mission about saving Private Ryan. The effort of eight men to save the life of one man was unbelievable. Two men gave their lives so that the company could first find the young private. When the company found Ryan, he would not leave his post or his men who were like brothers, which I can understand. So the company stayed with Ryan and the rest of his company and fought bravely so that Private Ryan would survive. The company headed by Captain Miller, fought without fear until they were dead, except Private Opum who was to chicken to do anything about what was going on. In the end, Captain Miller s company spent the lives of six good, hard fighting soldiers to save the life of one man.

I feel that Captain Miller made an excellent decision by staying with Ryan and the company defending the bridge. Not only did the company do their job of saving Private Ryan, but they also helped the entire American army win a strategic position that helped us take back France and eventually win the war.