10 Massively Underrated War Movie Performances

While the majority of accolades associated with individual performances within Saving Private Ryan are usually bestowed upon leading man Tom Hanks, special praise must be reserved for Giovanni Ribisi's evocative bow as Technician 4th Grade Irwin Wade. A medic who survives the initial landing at Omaha Beach, Wade is responsible for several of the movie's most emotionally charged flashpoints.

The segments in which Ribisi's soldier poignantly reflects on his relationship with his mother or his desperate attempts to rush to a mortally wounded Caparzo never fail to tug on even the most iron of heartstrings. Wade's undisguised trauma underlines in brutal clarity just how far the combatants are from the comforts of home.

That's without even mentioning the medic's demise. Ribisi is so convincing as a dying young man terrified of his own mortality that his death is arguably the most desolating fatality throughout Saving Private Ryan. Considering that 255 men bite the dust onscreen throughout the course of Steven Spielberg's epic war offering - typically in abjectly harrowing fashion - this is quite the morbid accomplishment.

It wouldn't have been possible without the exemplary - and criminally underrated - efforts of Ribisi in a career-highlight performance.