Continuity mistake: When the eight men are walking through the fields near the start, Vin Diesel has a cigarette. In some shots it is considerably longer than in previous shots. (00:39:45)
Continuity mistake: When Miller is collecting Upham from the group of translators and map readers, Upham is so confused and clumsy that he knocks everything off the table onto the floor (e.g. typewriter and helmets). Told by Miller to leave everything except his helmet, Upham picks up a German one by mistake. When sent back to the table to get his own, everything has miraculously jumped off the floor back onto the table. (00:40:30)
Continuity mistake: Close to the beginning of the film when the group are walking through a field where the sheep are, Vin Diesel in one shot puts his cigarette up to his mouth, in the following shot he is putting it up to his mouth again. (00:41:15)
Continuity mistake: Near the start, when Miller's men are walking through a field, and Jackson is talking about him and his rifle, in the background Caparzo has a cigarette in his mouth, but in the following shot it is not in his mouth or hands, then it's back in his mouth again. (00:42:40)
Factual error: When the Americans arrive in the first village (the one where the family is marooned upstairs in what's left of their house) there is a car. The car's registration plate follows the post-war system, not introduced until 1950. (00:49:00)
Continuity mistake: When Miller's men and the other captain's men find the French family hiding in a partly destroyed house, Caparzo goes up to get the kid and gives her his necklace, but in the following shot he's giving it to her again. In the shot after it's gone from the kids hand, then reappears again when he is walking towards Miller. (00:50:00)
Factual error: When Jackson takes out the German sniper, we see the German snipers point of view through his scope and he eventually spots Jackson who fires at him. First you see the flash, then the bang, and then the German sniper gets hit through his scope. This is wrong because bullets from a powerful sniper rifle travel much faster than sound, he couldn't have heard the shot before he got hit. (00:51:30)
Continuity mistake: After Caparzo has died from the sniper bullet, when Miller's men are grouped around Caparzo's body, Horvath is holding his gun in his right hand pointing it to the ground with his left arm by his side, but in the following shot, when Miller walks up, he is holding his weapon at waist height. (00:54:25)
Revealing mistake: When the American goes to sit down and hits a block of wood that hits a wall the wall falls down and there are German soldiers. In the next shot they are screaming, notice the man standing in front of the table the camera makes a close up of his face he is the one without a helmet. In the next shot all of them get shot right? Well look closely at that man in front of the table he gets shot and goes to sit down on the table and misses the table. He quickly sits back on the table. Look closely and you'll see it. (00:56:10)
Continuity mistake: Close to the beginning when they are in a town, and the soldier sits on the ground or a plank, the colour of the plank of wood changes from being old and dark brown to looking like brand new between shots. (00:56:10)
Continuity mistake: When Tom Hank's men are in the village close to the start of the film, the soldier knocks down the wall accidentally, and the German soldier at the front picks up his weapon and points it (this can be seen from outside the house looking in). Then when it cuts back to all the German soldiers, he's picking and pointing the weapon again. (00:56:20)
Continuity mistake: When the group of soldiers led by Captain Miller are in the village, and the Hill knocks the wall down accidentally, if you notice when Captain Hamill and his two others above shoot them dead, that a lot of the blood gets sprayed onto part of the back wall, but when we see the wall from inside the house, there is hardly any blood at all. (00:56:50)
Continuity mistake: When Miller's men reach the town where the first Ryan is (the wrong one), Miller tells Ryan the bad news about his brothers. When Ryan starts to cry and leans over to his captain the captain's hand is on Ryan's head, but in the following shot it is on the top of his back. (00:59:25)
Continuity mistake: The scene where they are looking for Ryan's dog tag. Doc comments they are laughing in front of all the guys walking by. One of the soldiers looks like Sal Mineo. Frustrated, Tom Hanks walks into the line of soldiers and civilians and starts asking if anybody has seen or knows James Ryan. The same Sal Mineo lookalike walks by him again. (01:15:10)
Continuity mistake: In the scene where all the 101st Airborne troops walk past as Rieben, Jackson, Melish and Miller are joking about the various dog tags, you can see an isolated shot of a young Italian-looking trooper walk past and stare dead at the group. A few minutes later as Miller is yelling at the procession, he shows up again in the background as Miller encounters the soldier whose hearing is impaired because of the grenade. You have to look quickly though, and the image is somewhat blurred. (01:17:10)
Continuity mistake: When Jackson has been given the dog tags to search through he looks for a place to sit. In this scene you see a black box with two yellow boxes at either side in the background. In the next scene the yellow box on the left has magically jumped up onto the black box in order for Jackson to kick it off and sit on it. (01:17:45)
Continuity mistake: When Miller's men are about to take the bunker under the radar tower, they are kneeling on the ground behind some bushes discussing their flanking moves and Jackson is about two feet away from Reiben to his left, but when it cuts Jackson is now behind Reiben. (01:22:35)
Continuity mistake: When they go to find Private Ryan there are eight of them, when they go to a French town and Caparzo picks up the little girl and he gets killed there are seven, right? Wrong. A few scenes later, the camera shows all eight of them marching on to the next town, only in a far away camera shot so it's hard to see. (01:23:11)
Factual error: In the scene where the American troops are storming the German radar station, you can see a few dead cows with oversized bellies provoked by putrefaction, which means that they were killed at least 12 hours ago. When one of the cows receives a bullet, you can see highly-oxigenated fully arterial red blood spurting from the wound, something impossible to happens in a dead body. Blood at this time of death should be nearly black or brown. (01:24:00)
Factual error: When the group is trying to take the German radio tower and the medic gets killed, the American hiding behind the cow is watching through a small rifle scope. The adjustment knobs should be on the top and side of the scope when held level and upright. The American is holding them crooked which means the crosshairs should be crooked, but when it shows the view through the scope, the crosshairs are perfectly vertical and horizontal. (01:24:15)
Suggested correction: He wasn't using a high powered sniper rifle. It was just a Springfield 1903 bolt action rifle which was the basic rifle of the US military until the M1 Garand. Snipers in WW2 didn't always have a scope either.
The Springfield still fired a supersonic round - all rifles do unless the round has been extensively modified, and no sniper would use such rounds.
The 30-06 is a powerful cartridge and the Springfield a very competent rifle. Snipers had scopes. The mistakes in that scene are that tower doesn't remotely look 400 yards away. Had it been then the projectile at 400 would have hit the German at a steep angle and could not have gone through the scope.