Rating: 
Summary: Great Sound
Review: If you've seen/heard the movie in Dolby Digital 5.1, you should give DTS a try. Having copies of both, the DTS sound is much more crisp and lifelike. It is incredible.
Rating: 
Summary: Action-packed, but thoughtful
Review: Shortly after the D-Day invasion of Normandy, a group of soldiers are sent on a propaganda mission to retrieve a man whose bothers have all been killed in the war. They struggle with the morality of risking the lives of their whole unit to save just one man, but they carry out their duty. There are some amazing action sequences in this film, most notably its famous Omaha Beach battle scene. However, it is also a deceptively complex film. The carnage of the battlefield is juxtaposed with the quiet offices of Washington DC, where decisions are made that lead to still more carnage. In one scene, the men, only a few days removed from the horror of Omaha, catch themselves behaving in an extremely insensitive manner while digging through the dogtags of dead soldiers while the survivors look on, making the point that personal experience of battle does not necessarily result in a heightened sense of empathy for one's fellow soldiers. This, in turn, adds another dimension to the scenes of the decision-makers, battle veterans themselves, who are willing to risk lives on the basis of sentiment. Yet, at the same time, who could fail to appreciate their heart-felt desire to rescue Mrs. Ryan's last son and return him to his mother? The character of Upham (Jeremy Davies) is particularly fascinating. Many viewers will probably dismiss him as a coward and that is unfortunate. I'm sure that there have been innumerable times that men have frozen during battle when decisive action was required of them, costing lives as a result. These men were not necessarily cowards, but merely unprepared for and overwhelmed by the magnitude of what they faced. Director Steven Spielberg and writer Robert Rodat have presented a character that can be identified with rather than the cartoonish craven chicken-heart that many lesser films have settled for. Spielberg, Rodat, stars Tom Hanks and Edward Burns, and everyone else involved with this production are to be commended.
Rating:
Summary: See it!
Review: This is one of those films where, once you've seen it, you can brag about it. I'm no tech-buff, so I can't say if the DVD is the perfect translation from the movie, but I can't find much to complain about. The sound is great, and I found myself lost amidst the big battles and gunfights. As for the plot, it goes through all the ups and downs of a war, people getting torn apart between values and priorities, finally succumbing to the impossibility of it all and doing things that border on the fantastic. It's very riveting, you will be too busy being angry and sad with the people in the movie to nitpick about some inconsistencies. Great movie, I only wish the ending... oops, better stop now.
Rating:
Summary: harrowing!
Review: i love this film, it makes me think how lucky i am not to have been involved in war. this is the ultimate depiction of hell,murder that is sanctioned. the more i see this film the harder it becomes to watch, im now at the point where i have to leave the room when mellish and that medic dude are killed. i think its the atmosphere of being trapped by death that gets to me. u can see they think death is for other people until a knife or bullet proves them wrong.
i think this is a very moving film designed to make people realize jus what war is and remind us how incredible the people who lived and died in it were.
Rating:
Summary: Powerful film about the American experience in WWII
Review: Saving Private Ryan has been hailed as the greatest war movie ever made. I personally still favor several others, including The Bridge on the River Kwai, Lawrence of Arabia, Spartacus, and, perhaps a bit perversely, Dr. Strangelove. Still, Saving Private Ryan is a riveting, monumental movie, and it is the greatest film about the American experience in World War II. I don't think any other picture has ever so graphically and so unflinchingly shown what a terrible toll war - any war - exacts on armed forces. This is not a movie for children. Director Steven Spielburg seems to be our reigning movie making expert on W.W.II. In the early 1980s, he made the dreadful 1941, which was about German submarines prowling the West Coast. A few years later, he redeemed himself with the remarkable Empire of the Sun, which dealt with the Japanese occupation of China. In 1993, he gave us Schindler's List. This story of the plight of Jews in a concentration camp in Nazi Germany may be the most honored film ever made. It is no wonder, then, that Saving Private Ryan was made with every attempt at authenticity. I must warn you that this attention to detail includes some of the most violent and gruesome scenes ever put on film. Usually, I make a small attempt to protest excessive violence in movies, and I could argue here that Spielburg could have made his point with less of it here. Or that he has made the ultimate arguement for gun control. I think in this case, however, that, if we are to continue to have wars, then at least the atrocities that are a natural part of them have, for once, been portrayed with complete honesty. The movie begins on June 6, 1941 with the Normandy Invasion. This very long scene is one of the largest and most ambitious ever filmed. We watch as Captain John Miller [Tom Hanks] and his platoon, along with thousands of other soldiers, leave their landing boats and attempt to storm the beach. On the cliffs above are the well fortified German bunkers. Machine gun bullets come whizzing down like a rain from Hell. I won't go into gruesome detail, but one tends to watch this sequence in a sort of frozen horror. It is so lifelike that I have seen audience members flinch and act as though they needed to duck for cover. Back in Washington, a military office discovers that three brothers from Iowa have been killed on the same day in three different fronts. A fourth brother, Private James Francis Ryan [Matt Damon], a member of the 101st Airborne, is missing in action somewhere in France. It is decided that he must be found and brought home to his mother. The movie thankfully implies that this decision is a heartfelt one on the part of the military. Captain Miller's platoon is given the difficult task of finding Private Ryan. I will give you just a bit of history. The Normandy Invasion, while well thought out and most likely necessary, came at a very high price. And it was just the beginning, for the rest of France had to be reclaimed mile after dangerous mile. So, when Miller's platoon sets off to locate Private Ryan, they know they are going into a hornet's nest of German troops. To say this would have been a dangerous assignment is an understatement. The small group of soldiers is none too pleased at the thought of going into such territory to look for one man who may well be dead. Captain Miller, in the tradition of the best leaders, keeps his own opinion of the assignment to himself. He manages to keep his men on track, no matter what their personal feelings are. The search is filled with dreadful encounters, anger, frustration, and all the madness which is part of war's nature. Tom Hanks is such a fine actor with such an enormous range that it's rather difficult to say which one of his many performances is the finest. His Captain John Miller is decidedly near the top of the list. One of the finest elements of this movie is how it reminds us that real heroes are never super human. They are ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. Hank's Miller is close to being an Every Man. Before the war, he was a school teacher in Pennsylvania, which is so typical of the men and women who made up the troops in W.W.II. In fact, there is nothing special about any of his man. Private Ryan, in fact, is just a kid from rural Iowa. By emphasizing their ordinariness, Spielburg reminds us that we are all special. Saving Private Ryan's point of view is more or less objective. By not playing too much on easy emotions, it manages to be patriotic, especially in homage to all veterans of W.W.II, without ever glorifying warfare.
Rating:
Summary: absolutley amazing
Review: This movie is great, ensnaring with its recreation of the normandy invasion's, right until the captivating bridge battle. The picture quality is amazing and the sound is beautiful, making the battles come to life. After you see it the first time you'll still want to see it again. Buy this movie. And what is wrong with Bengamin Pascall, (a reviewer) The landing in the movie took place on OMAHA, a beach where the americans landed, the british and canadians landed at different beaches. I mean come on, Britain is great but why would that persuade you to give the greatest war movie of all time down. Buy this movie you won't regret it.
Rating:
Summary: AWESOME
Review: Words cannot describe how good this film is, even though it gets a little too fictional after the first 20 minutes. A Captain leading a squad of 8 to save one paratrooper in the middle of World War II? Sounds more like today's warfare style. World War II was fought in battles that included hundreds of thousands of men, not in tiny squads such as today's Special Ops. Well back to the point, this movie set the standard for all the war films that have come out since SPR such as Pearl Harbor, Thin Red Line, Black Hawk Down, and We Were Soldiers. The only ones I recommend in that bunch are Pearl Harbor excluding the final scene, BHD, and WWS.
Rating:
Summary: The ultimate war movie!
Review: If you want to see war for real, watch this movie. The explosions look real. The soldiers look real. The bullets sound real (you can even hear the metal jackets of the MG's showering on the concrete). The acting is superb, and the story will make any grown man cry.
There is no movie about World War Two or any other war that is better than SPR! Buy it now you won't be sorry.
Rating: 
Summary: Great Battle Sequences; Tepid Movie
Review: For once the hype surrounding a Spielberg film proves accurate: the first half-hour of the film, which shows the WWII Allied invasion of Normandy, is every bit as powerful as you've heard, a knock-you-flat piece of film-making that surpasses every other cinematic image of war's hell. Unfortunately, D-Day as such has absolutely nothing to do with the story of SAVING PRIVATE RYAN: once this brilliant sequence is over, we are left with a highly sentimental, tiresomely repetitive, and completely unoriginal film that drags on and on to an extremely obvious conclusion. The story concerns a young man (Matt Damon) whose brothers have been killed in battle, leaving him as his parents' only surviving child. Top brass decide that Pvt. Ryan must be sent home--but they are not entirely sure where he is in war-torn Europe. Capt. John Miller (Tom Hanks) is accordingly snatched up from the D-Day battle and along with a handful of men is sent to find Ryan and bring him back in one piece--and at this point the film pretty much comes to a grinding halt. Hanks once again proves why he is among Hollywood's most bankable stars: like James Stewart, he has an everyman quality sure to appeal to most viewers--but although he remains as likable as ever, the script really doesn't give Hanks much to work with, and neither he nor his co-stars are greatly memorable. Indeed, once the opening battle sequence ends the film becomes so slow and so repetitive that you could easily nip outside, cut the lawn, and come back in to find you've not missed anything at all. Final word? The opening battle scene is worth the movie, but don't think you're missing anything if you can't stay awake for the end.
Rating:
Summary: One of the best films of all-time.
Review: Tom Hanks leads 7 men into enemy territory to retrieve a paratrooper whose brothers were killed in combat. Brilliantly directed war film from Steven Spielberg displays the two most graphically violent and intense battle sequences in movie history (Only matched by Black Hawk Down). It's a harrowing portrayal of heroism and sacrifice, and war has never looked more hellish. Incredible performances from the whole cast, particularly Tom Hanks and Barry Pepper, and an evocative score from John Williams.
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