“They resented this guy”: Why the cast of ‘Saving Private Ryan’ were bitter about Matt Damon
Ever since the 1990s, Matt Damon has been known as one of cinema’s most charismatic leading men.
Whether playing the action juggernaut Jason Bourne in the Bourne movie franchise or the smart-ass kid trying to figure out his life in Good Will Hunting, Damon has always kept his films rooted in some form of reality, as fans can see the human behind everything. Although Damon was ready for the big time, things started to move quickly once he got a call from Steven Spielberg.
When working with the acclaimed actor on the film Saving Private Ryan, Damon recalled what got him the job as the title character, telling GQ, “I got that part because of Robin Williams. When we were in Boston, we were rehearsing, and Spielberg came in because he was shooting Amistad and was shooting a scene with Anthony Hopkins at the Capital. [Robin] knew it was never bad to meet the greatest filmmaker of all time”.
Although Damon had originally read for Private Ryan and had gone to various auditions, what sealed the deal for Spielberg was when he saw Damon flex his chops in a completely different movie. Damon remembered: “He met me in person and said, ‘I think I know you from somewhere’. I said, ‘Well, I did this movie, Courage Under Fire’. He said, ‘You know, that’s funny because that’s the exact type of person I want to play Private Ryan, but he’s too thin’, because I was playing a heroin addict”.
Once the cast was finalised for the war drama, it was time to undergo training, with some of the cast members going through gruelling work before stepping in front of the camera. Instead of the usual guidelines that went into training, Damon had said that his job when they were training was to do absolutely nothing.
According to Damon, he didn’t have to undergo any type of training, recalling, “[Spielberg] made me not go to boot camp so that the other guys would resent me. They all went through this experience, and they all bonded, but because I was the character they were looking for, and they resented this guy that they were risking their lives to go find, Steven purposefully kept me away from them”.
Even without going through basic training, the camaraderie among the cast is fantastic, with Tom Hanks playing the valiant Captain Miller, who leads a ragtag team of soldiers to rescue this one man from combat. Although Damon may not have been as close with any of his castmates, that resentment fed into the power behind some of the greatest scenes.
When looking at one of the pivotal scenes in the film where Ryan is pleading his case to keep fighting in the war, each of the surviving members of the unit remains completely stonefaced, looking right through any sort of defence that he has. Despite his willingness to serve his country, each of those men knows exactly what they are there for and will use everything they can to ensure the mission is completed properly.
Regardless of the demeanour on set, Damon’s role became pivotal in film history, being one of the most graphic and intriguing looks into the carnage that soldiers faced in World War II. Damon may have had to face some harsh truths from his castmates, but it was all about improving the scene.
Is Saving Private Ryan the best war movie ever made?
Well, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, of course, but there’s a strong argument that it is certainly one of the most accurate depictions of the battles that littered World War II, and especially D-Day. Famously capturing everything about the experience, but not the smell, the movie was watched by veterans who felt captivated and scared by the cinematic experience for being too close to the real things.
Realism seemed to be a keen part of Spielberg’s intent with this picture. A director usually more interested in story than realism, the filmmaker decided to pay tribute to the horrors of war by bringing this one down to earth, even if that meant making the cast hate Matt Damon.
