Books, Arts & Manners: Spielberg’s Soldiers

STEVEN Spielberg’s World War II movie, Saving Private Ryan, has come under fire from conservatives, including John Podhoretz in The Weekly Standard and Richard Grenier in the Washington Times. Correctly, Podhoretz and Grenier argue that Spielberg’s failure to explain at any point in the film what the war was about can be read as a condemnation of war-making, even in the case of this most just and necessary of wars. It can be read that way. But should it?

When it comes to the history of that war, polls reveal a breathtaking ignorance on the part of the American public. In a recent Roper poll only 57 per cent of respondents knew that the war occurred in the first half of this century, only 30 per cent knew that Eisenhower was in charge of the European theater, and only 27 per cent knew what the term D-Day referred to. That Spielberg neglected to explain any of these things, or many other relevant facts, to an audience raised on MTV and Beverly Hills 90210 has left him open to charges that his film will pervert the average viewer’s understanding of the conflict. A viewer who enters the theater not knowing why the war was fought in the first place will leave still entirely unenlightened. He might indeed conclude that the war was not fought for any reason worthy of mention.

RJ

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Russell Jenkins

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STEVEN Spielberg’s World War II movie, Saving Private Ryan, has come under fire from conservatives, including John Podhoretz in The Weekly Standard and Richard Grenier in the Washington Times. Correctly, Podhoretz and Grenier argue that Spielberg’s failure to explain at any point in the film what the war was about can be read as a condemnation of war-making, even in the case of this most just and necessary of wars. It can be read that way. But should it?

When it comes to the history of that war, polls reveal a breathtaking ignorance on the part of the American public. In a recent Roper poll only 57 per cent of respondents knew that the war occurred in the first half of this century, only 30 per cent knew that Eisenhower was in charge of the European theater, and only 27 per cent knew what the term D-Day referred to. That Spielberg neglected to explain any of these things, or many other relevant facts, to an audience raised on MTV and Beverly Hills 90210 has left him open to charges that his film will pervert the average viewer’s understanding of the conflict. A viewer who enters the theater not knowing why the war was fought in the first place will leave still entirely unenlightened. He might indeed conclude that the war was not fought for any reason worthy of mention.