Price For Peace/Shooting War/Saving Private Ryan, D-Day Edition
Starring: Tom Hanks, Tom Sizemore
Director: Steven Spielberg
Rating: R
Runtime: 347 minutes
4 discs

This program contains the classic World War II drama SAVING PRIVATE RYAN, along with two compelling documentaries on the war, PRICE FOR PEACE and SHOOTING WAR: WORLD WAR II COMBAT CAMERAMEN.

SAVING PRIVATE RYAN
Steven Spielberg directed this powerful, realistic re-creation of WWII's D-day invasion and the immediate aftermath. The story opens with a prologue in which a veteran brings his family to the American cemetery at Normandy, and a flashback then joins Capt. John Miller (Tom Hanks) and GIs in a landing craft making the June 6, 1944, approach to Omaha Beach to face devastating German artillery fire. This mass slaughter of American soldiers is depicted in a compelling, unforgettable 24-minute sequence. Miller's men slowly move forward to finally take a concrete pillbox. On the beach littered with bodies is one with the name "Ryan" stenciled on his backpack. Army Chief of Staff Gen. George C. Marshall (Harve Presnell), learning that three Ryan brothers from the same family have all been killed in a single week, requests that the surviving brother, Pvt. James Ryan (Matt Damon), be located and brought back to the United States. Capt. Miller gets the assignment, and he chooses a translator, Cpl. Upham (Jeremy Davis), skilled in language but not in combat, to join his squad of right-hand man Sgt. Horvath (Tom Sizemore), plus privates Mellish (Adam Goldberg), Medic Wade (Giovanni Ribisi), cynical Reiben (Edward Burns) from Brooklyn, Italian-American Caparzo (Vin Diesel), and religious Southerner Jackson (Barry Pepper), an ace sharpshooter who calls on the Lord while taking aim. Having previously experienced action in Italy and North Africa, the close-knit squad sets out through areas still thick with Nazis. After they lose one man in a skirmish at a bombed village, some in the group begin to question the logic of losing more lives to save a single soldier. The film's historical consultant is Stephen E. Ambrose, and the incident is based on a true occurance in Ambrose's 1994 bestseller D-Day: June 6, 1944.

PRICE FOR PEACE
This compelling documentary, executive produced by Steven Spielberg and historian Stephen Ambrose, reflects on the Pacific Theater in World War II. Using archival footage to document the period between the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941 to the American occupation of Japan in 1945, director James Moll provides complex portraits of the individuals involved in the war. Interview subjects include both American and Japanese veterans, like Paul Hibbets, who piloted the mission to bomb Hiroshima, as well as Japanese Americans who suffered through internment camps.

SHOOTING WAR: WORLD WAR II COMBAT CAMERAMEN
Everyone knows the impact of a photograph, but no images have more power than the ones captured during war. This documentary, executive produced by Steven Spielberg and narrated by Tom Hanks, chronicles the contributions made by World War II combat photographers. From documenting the awe-inspiring military in action to the horrific consequences battle, war photographers helped to connect people to the situation and have provided invaluable historical documents. Featured subjects include cult filmmaker Russ Meyer, who worked a newsreel cameraman during World War II, and legendary director John Ford, who produced award-winning documentaries on the war.