What are some of your favorite war movies? Did those particular films affect your approach to Private Ryan either visually or dramatically?
Spielberg: In terms of features, the World War II pictures that inspired me the most were William Wellman’s Battleground [1949], Sam Fuller’s The Steel Helmet [1951] and Don Siegel’s Hell Is for Heroes [1962]. I didn’t really draw from those films aesthetically, but they made a big impression on me while I was growing up in Arizona and watching a lot of TV. I haven’t studied World War II films, but I’m very familiar with them because they were a part of my formative years.
In truth, on Private Ryan I tried to take the opposite approach of nearly every one of my favorite World War II movies. Films that were made during the actual war years never really concerned themselves with realism, but more with extolling the virtues of winning and sacrificing ourselves upon the altar of freedom. Those were the themes of many World War II pictures, which also were designed to help sell war bonds. I love those movies, but I think Vietnam pushed people from my generation to tell the truth about war without glorifying it. As a result, I’ve taken a much harder approach to telling this particular story. From a visual perspective, I was much more influenced by various World War II documentaries Memphis Belle, Why We Fight, John Ford’s Midway movie and John Huston’s film on the liberation of the Nazi death camps than I was by any of Hollywood’s representations of the war. I was also very inspired by [photographer] Robert Capa’s documentary work, and the eight surviving stills he took during the assault on Omaha Beach.
Your right-hand man, Janusz Kaminski, told me that the two of you like to challenge each other artistically, and that your relationship sometimes takes on an air of friendly competition. Do you agree with that assessment?
Spielberg: I don’t see our relationship as being competitive. We are collaborators and friends, and we give each other tremendous emotional support. Because we have so much mutual respect, neither of us wants to let the other down. We’ve developed our relationship over the course of four movies together, and we’re about to do a fifth one, Memoirs of a Geisha. Janusz is the first brother I’ve ever had on a set; I feel closer to him than any other collaborator I’ve had in my career.
How would you compare your visual approach on Private Ryan to what you’ve done together on previous films? Do you consider this picture to be a departure?
Spielberg: The whole movie has a different style than anything I’ve done before. It’s very hard and rough, and in the best sense, I think it’s extraordinarily sloppy. But reality is sloppy it’s not the perfect dolly shot or crane move. We were attempting to put fear and chaos on film. If the lens got splattered with sand and blood, I didn’t say, ’Oh my God, the shot’s ruined, we have to do it over again’ we just used it in the picture. Our camera was affected in the same way that a combat cameraman’s would be when an explosion or bullet hit happened nearby.
About 90 percent of Private Ryan was shot with handheld cameras. How did that strategy influence your role as director? Did it affect the amount of control you had over the images?
Spielberg: I still had a lot of control because I was watching everything on video monitors; I could always do something over again if I didn’t like it. I was also recording the takes so I could pore over the playbacks to see if things were working or not. On Schindler’s List and Amistad, I had video assist, but no playback. Because we had so many physical effects working during the production of Private Ryan, every department needed to watch the playbacks to see if they were doing their jobs. On this film, I departed from my ’purist’ mode and brought in modern technology.
[ continued on page 3 ]