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‘Too Horrible To Watch': Tom Hanks Revealed He Cried While Watching His Spielberg Movie Saving Private Ryan
Saving Private Ryan, directed by Steven Spielberg, became one of the highest-grossing films of 1998, besides winning several accolades.
One of the most celebrated actors in Hollywood, Tom Hanks is known for both his comedic and dramatic roles. Among the few movies that shaped his 45-year-long career is Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan.
The movie is considered one of the best war movies ever made and is well renowned for stirring strong emotions in viewers. Echoing the same, Hanks shared in a recent interview that he “wept” after watching the film for the first time.
The beach sequence that left Tom Hanks in tears
“In our very first talk about the movie, Steven laid out how modern cinema technology made the movie possible in the first place—especially for the Omaha Beach sequence,” Hanks told Vanity Fair.
Labeled as cinema’s most brutal depiction of war, the movie concentrates on the characters' reactions to the violence, despite the scene's extremely graphic brutality, which includes bloody water and bodies scattered across the sand. It depicts the soldiers' eyes going dark and their minds beginning to form PTSD.
![Tom Hanks, Matt Damon, Tom Sizemore, Adam Goldberg, Max Martini, and Demetri Goritsas in Saving Private Ryan [Photo Credits- IMDb]](https://www.pinkvilla.com/images/2024-04/1714135842_1280-x-720-2024-04-26t182026-032.jpg "Tom Hanks, Matt Damon, Tom Sizemore, Adam Goldberg, Max Martini, and Demetri Goritsas in Saving Private Ryan [Photo Credits- IMDb]")
Talking about the sequence, Hanks said, “When I first saw the completed sequence, I wept. The landing, from the boats to the top of the bluff, was just too horrible to watch without becoming undone.”
“He said no combat movie would have ever been like it. I knew immediately that our job as actors would be to behave and react in the actual physical moment, that we would be trained accordingly over time, and that anything that happened on-screen would be as it should,” said Hanks.
About the film Saving Private Ryan
Set in 1944, the epic war film takes place in France during World War II. Captain John Miller (Hanks) leads a group of troops on their quest to find Private James Francis Ryan (Matt Damon) and return him home safely after three of his brothers are killed in action.
Talking about his role and filming for it, Hanks said that his rank as captain mattered in training. I had some responsibility and “some luxury (my own tent!)” However, on the set, he said, “the script played itself out.” He added, “We all had our moments in the movie and rooted for each other.”
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