By Jack Jenkins

Saving Private Ryan Opening Sequence Analysis

Setting

• The opening sequence of ‘Saving Private Ryan’ establishes the genre, ideology, representation, narrative and the institution of the film. ‘Saving Private Ryan’ is an action-war film. The film begins with an American family walking around the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial, an elderly man in the family then walks over to one specific grave and breaks down crying. The shot then zooms into his face and then cuts to a mid shot of the beach defenses used during the Normandy Landings, a text fades into the shot reading, ‘June 6th 1944.’ The audience then realise that this opening sequence is all about the Normandy Landings.

Paramount

• In this opening sequence the institution of the film is established straight away, the company who made the film is shown to be ‘Paramount’ this is a huge film corporation who are famous for making many high quality films such as, ‘Forrest Gump’, ‘Titanic’, and ‘The Curious Case of Benjamin Button’ this shows the audience that this film will be of a very high standard.

genre

• The genre is established when you see the elderly man walk through the cemetery. The audience immediately know that the genre of the film is based upon WW2 when the first gravestone is shown, the iconography establishes genre as the WW2 gravestones are well known so the audience will know that the film is based upon war. Other iconography has been used to establish genre, when the scene cuts to the Normandy Landings scene, the beach defences shown at the beginning of this scene show the audience that this is a war film as theses beach defences are also well known and closely related to the Second World War. Another genre is established during the beginning of this scene as well. The genre of ‘action’ is established at the beginning of the Normandy Landing scene; when the text appears, and the audience become aware of the date they immediately think about the fighting the occurred during these landings and the audience create a sense of danger as they know that many American soldiers were critically injured and killed during these landings.

Main character/protagonist

• The ideology is not very well established in the opening scene, as the main character is not established very much in the opening scene, so the audience cannot get an idea as to who the protagonist or antagonist are. However, when the main character is introduced the audience know that he is in fact a soldier about to land on one of the Normandy beaches so the audience would usually immediately identify him as the protagonist.

narrative

• The narrative of the story is established in the opening scene as the film begins during the modern day, the audience know this as the characters are wearing clothes that are quite modern and the characters have modern hairstyles and are using modern technology/equipment (the father is using a camera at the cemetery). The scene then cuts to the Normandy Landings, the audience know this is in the past as the text reads ‘June 6th 1944.’ The audience know this is in the past as the props and costume used at the beginning of the film are more associated with modern day.

representation

• The representation of soldiers is established in the opening sequence when the audience see the soldiers in the armoured vehicle going towards the beaches. The soldiers are shown as being young men who look incredibly frightened; you know this by the way they behave: the soldiers are shown shaking, being sick and looking very vigilant. The director has represented them in this way to show the audience that soldiers during WW2 were not the stereotype that most people perhaps believed them to be, but normal, innocent young men. The director has perhaps done this to make the Normandy Landings more life-like and believable for the audience.