Contrast the dissing of Saving Private Ryan with Spielberg's other WWII blockbuster, Schindler's List. Private Ryan doesn't even get a look from the liberal Hollywood elite. Schindler's List wins best picture.
What's the difference, you ask? Schindler's List highlighted the plight of liberals' favorite group of helpless victims, the Jews -- at least until they became politically incorrect after 9/11 -- while damning liberals' favorite bogeymen, the Nazis.
Saving Private Ryan honored the American fighting man and America's role in the destruction of the greatest evil the world had faced to that time.
No movie that honors America will ever win best picture in this day and age.