War is hell! But it's also exciting - - at least during the outrageously brilliant opening and closing half-hour of this Oscar-snaffling Spielberg epic. Shame about Matt Damon and the sickly soft-focus centre, though.
DVD Extras:
Nice timing, fellas. The ideal Christmas gift for the veteran in your life who, after a punishing summer of documentaries, reconstructions and dramatisations, is surely a little bit Omaha-ed out. You get a remixed-audio version of the film and a fresh rack of featurettes - - all chipped off a chunk of on-set interview footage. The best of the lot is Recreating Omaha Beach, which shows how cultivating chaos is a highly ordered business, while Boot Camp sees the actors grudgingly admit the benefit of being shouted at by a drill instructor. There's also Making Saving Private Ryan, a longish doc with plenty of technical revelations and between-take fooling. Spielberg's comments are as articulate as ever and it's engrossing for fans, but the `commemorative' tag is both stretched and tasteless.
