Favorite Scenes of All Time: #7-Omaha Beach (Saving Private Ryan)

I have a love/hate relationship with the Omaha Beach invasion scene from Saving Private Ryan. On one hand, it's arguably the best, most brutal, realistic, and unflinching battle scenes in the history of war films. On the other hand, it began countless trends in Hollywood that are now so common that it's getting f**king annoying. But while these trends are overused and stagnant in most Hollywood films nowadays, at the time Saving Private Ryan was made these advancements and tricks were flat out groundbreaking, paving the way for countless directors to take these tricks and try to pass them off as their own. Sadly, it's a trend in Hollywood that will never go away (just think of all the movies that featured "bullet time" after The Matrix was released).

When Saving Private Ryan was released, Hollywood had more or less perfected camera technology. Specialized lenses eliminated the most stubborn of lens flare, internal servos and gyros allowed steady-cams to collect a perfectly level picture despite constant jostling, and digital film cameras allowed a much broader spectrum of colors to permeate the screen. So when Steven Spielberg wanted to recreate a scene from war without the use of any of these camera features, a lot of people thought he had lost his mind.

But the gambit paid off, and in the end we received a scene that is just as gut-punchingly brutal to watch today as it was when it was released. Not eliminating the lens flare of the scene added a depth of realism to the battle, especially since it would be a common sight as soldiers were emerging from the freezing waters. The elimination of the steady-cam created an effect known today (for better or worse) as shaky-cam, conveying a frantic sense of confusion to the viewer which creates an emotional link with the scared, panicked soldier on D-Day without saying a word. Nowadays Hollywood uses this trick non-stop, even in places where it doesn't belong. The Hunger Games even uses this effect in the opening scene, when Katniss is just walking through a field!

But most daring of all was Spielberg's decision to de-saturate the color spectrum to create a film that had a sepia toned look and splashes of water and blood occasionally obscuring the shot. By doing so through the painstaking switching of lenses and cameras Spielberg was able to create a movie that looked half Hollywood, and half documentary, adding a level of realism never before scene in a movie. Nowadays you can see the same effect in every "stylized" Hollywood film through the use of computer effects labs, but back in the day it was innovative and unheard of, creating a scene that has aged as well and resounds as strongly with the audience as it did the day it was released.

The entire film is a work of art, but this scene in particular stands out in peoples' minds as the high point of the movie. And while apparently Saving Private Ryan lost the Oscar that year to Shakespeare in Love, the test of time (and common sense) reminds us that it is still the superior movie for countless reasons.

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