Free screening honoring veterans. Steven Spielberg's Oscar-winning film opens with one of the most evocative dramatizations of D-Day , the June 6, 1944 Allied invasion of Normandy during World War II. After three brothers die in combat, United States Army Chief of Staff, George C. Marshall, decides to alleviate some of their mother's grief when he sends Captain Miller and eight of his men to find a fourth brother, Private James Ryan (Matt Damon), and bring him back home to his mother. Spielberg's unflinchingly realistic war film virtually redefined the genre when it was released.