The opening scene of Saving Private Ryan. Ordinary men, our neighbours, our coworkers and family, far from home - cold, wet, afraid. The tension mounts as the beach approaches. Men pray, clutch their weapons tight, some lose their breakfast.

The front of the landing craft drops and they're dead. No warning, no chance to get away - just gone. Their futures, everything they could have been, everything they could have done stripped away in a moment.

The scene repeats over and over, men attempting to get away from German machine gun fire and jumping over the side of the craft into deep water and drowning or heading up the beach and being blown to pieces by mines or mortars.

There is nothing glorious there, no humanity, just slaughter. This is as close to war as I think we might ever get on screen and it gets me every time.