how many people in here would think that stephen ambrose was a consultant to the movie? raise your hands if you think it was. that he wasn't. ambrose was really an advisor after the movie was already made. let me tell you a story that may be most of you don't know? ambrose calls me up one day, we were best friends and shared everything for 30 years. our families grew up together and we did a lot of projects together, not just on a museum, but we owned sailboats together, bought a dive resort, planned to -- planned tours of europe together, we went on boat rides together, we did a lot of things together. we shared all the good news and the bad news with each other. he called me and said, steven spielberg just called me. he said, i have this new movie. ambrose said, yeah, we have been hearing about it. he said, i want you to come out here and look at it, and tell me what you think about it. and steve said, well, i am too busy. i am writing a book, i can't fly out there, send me a tape. well, anybody in the movie business knows, you do not release anything -- this was nine m

nick mueller talks about the museum's connection to the film and shares stories about historian stephen ambrose, a consultant on ," and theivate ryan museum's early founder. mr. mueller also talks about the reaction of historians and military leaders to the film and its legacy today. this 35-minute event was part of a symposium held at the national world war ii museum to mark the 20th anniversary of the film's release. >> welcome back everybody for

the historian and great friend of this institution, stephen ambrose, recalls that he just gave up on talking about d-day without talking about "the longest day." he got used to introducing norman cota as robert mitcham in "the longest day." or benjamin vandervoort as john wayne in "the longest day." cornelius ryan, realized he had been on a great formula. he went on to write "the last battle." and "a bridge too far." he died of cancer in 1974. he sold the rights to "the last battle" which was never made and the rights to "a bridge too far" which was made. it came out in 1976. the multiple perspective narrative has been taken up by other writers and was also used in other forms of motion pictures. re-watching the longest day, i realized it anticipates the disaster movies of the 1970s. the idea of having multiple vignettes was a way of showing how an event happens to many people at the same time. zanuck doubles down in war pictures and is involved in the development of a number of classics including patent. he has been earned by tora tora tora. he puts a lot of effort into it and it dr