10 Most Intense Movie Openings Ever

There's no two ways about it - Saving Private Ryan's Normandy landing sequence on Omaha Beach is the most intense opening of any movie ever.

After a brief present-day scene shows an elderly veteran visiting a cemetery - later revealed to be Pvt. Ryan (Matt Damon) - Steven Spielberg cuts back to 1944 for an almost unbearable 20-minute opening set-piece on Omaha Beach.

The relentlessly brutal sequence shows the absolute horror of war as it is really is. Soldiers live and die on the flip of a coin - some are mercifully shot dead in an instant while others are left to die slowly with their guts hanging out.

Other traumatised soldiers pick up their own severed limbs, while some follow Captain Miller (Tom Hanks) in attempting to push forward and repel the entrenched German forces.

A scene as nauseatingly violent as it is technically sublime, Spielberg and cinematography Janusz Kamiński do a better job than any filmmaker ever has of portraying war not as cool or entertaining but matter-of-factly sickening.

It is a scene that absolutely puts the viewer there with Miller and his men, and refuses to let up until Omaha Beach has been secured.