Last summer a little war movie named "Saving Private Ryan" was released to near universal acclaim and tremendous box office.

      A lot has been written about the film, much of it pertaining to its talented ensemble of actors.

       Veterans Tom Hanks ("Bachelor Party") and Tom Sizemore ("True Romance") teamed up with up-and-comers like Adam Goldberg ("Dazed and Confused," "Friends"), Giovanni Ribisi ("The Wonder Years," "Friends"), Jeremy Davies ("Spanking the Monkey") and Edward Burns ("The Brothers McMullen") to find the title character (Matt Damon) somewhere behind enemy lines and get him on a plane back home.

      Private James Ryan is a young soldier whose ticket out of World War II is a costly one: all three of his older brothers have been killed in battle, leaving him behind as his mother's only living child.

      Each of the aforementioned actors acquit themselves nicely, with Hanks probably on his way to a third, well-deserved Oscar for his performance as the rescue mission's leader, Captain John Miller. But there is another performance in the film, one with far less screen time than the others, which deserves mention.

      About a third of the way through the film, not long after the devastating depiction of D-Day that opens the film, the squad is making its way through the rubble of a demolished French village. They are looking for information on Ryan's whereabouts when they stumble into trouble only to be rescued by Captain Hamill (Ted Danson), a fellow American. The scene that follows is the heart of the movie.

      Miller describes his mission to Hamill, who listens silently. Up until this point, Miller and his men have been doing their duty with more than a little harbored resentment. They cannot see the good in risking the lives of seven men to save one. And up until this point the audience tends to side with the soldiers.

      Until Hamill puts it all in perspective. "I understand what you guys are doing," he says.

      "You do?" asks an incredulous Miller. To which Hamill responds: "I have a brother."

      In those four words, spoken by the under-appreciated Ted Danson, the theme of the movie becomes clear. What seemed at first to be an indictment of the absurdity of war becomes a statement on the glory of nobility amidst overwhelming evil.

      None of this would work if it weren't for the unforced gravity Danson gives to his character. Best known for his Emmy-winning work on the long-running sitcom "Cheers," Danson has never quite broken the stereotype of "television actor." Movies like "Getting Even With Dad" haven't helped.

       Before "Cheers," however, Danson gave small performances in a couple of films that earmarked him as an actor to watch, in much the same way that Ribisi, Davies and Goldberg's performances in "Ryan" have for them.

      "The Onion Field," released in 1979, concerned two sets of partners. James Woods and Franklyn Seales play a couple of small-time 60's crooks who, by unfortunate coincidence, end up kidnapping two young plain clothes Los Angeles police officers (Danson and John Savage). Before the film's halfway point, Danson is lying dead in a ditch outside of Bakersfield and Woods and Seales have graduated from armed robbery to murder.

      Danson has little more screen time in "The Onion Field" than he did in "Ryan" but his ghost haunts the rest of the film. Woods and Savage have the showier roles (Savage's breakdown scene is devastating to watch), but it is the innate decency with which Danson imbues Officer Campbell that creates a thirst for justice in the audience. This affable young man who loved his mother and playing the bagpipes makes a deep impression on viewers. The chaotic events that follow, which include the longest trial in California history up to that point, make the tragedy even more palpable.

      Danson returned to screens two years later in the modern noir "Body Heat." William Hurt starred as a sleazy Miami lawyer who gets roped into a shaky murder scheme by his married lover (Kathleen Turner). Danson played Peter Lowenstein, Hurt's prosecutor buddy who fears his friend may be in over his head.

      That description of Danson's character doesn't do him justice. His performance as the idiosyncratic Lowenstein would be right at home on "Ally McBeal," yet is strangely appropriate for the world created by writer/director Lawrence Kasdan.

      Lowenstein may wear nerdy glasses, enjoy tap dancing around the local diner and have a fondness for bad puns, but from the beginning he is far sharper than Hurt, to his detriment, gives him credit for.

      Then came "Cheers," which, when it finally took off in its third season, catapulted Danson to stardom. Danson first took advantage of his sudden success in several well-received television films ("Something About Amelia, "When the Bough Breaks," "Just Between Friends") before branching out into features. "A Fine Mess," his aptly named 1986 farce in which he was teamed with a spectacularly unfunny Howie Mandel, was a deserved bomb. But the following year Danson teamed up with fellow TV star Tom Selleck and Steve Guttenberg for the comedy "Three Men and a Baby." The film was a smash, and movie offers poured in for Danson.

      Over the course of the following few years, some of Danson's choices, such as "Dad," were sound. Others ("Made in America") were not. But the film that has best tapped his potential as a leading man was 1989's "Cousins," a romantic comedy based on the 1976 French hit "Cousin, Cousine." Danson played a dance instructor who discovers that his wife is having an affair with his cousin. He and his cousin's wife (Isabella Rossellini) strike up a friendship and eventually fall in love.

      Danson's character, a charming misfit, was close enough to his television persona for audience comfort, yet different enough to avoid cries of typecasting. One of the best romantic leads in ages, Danson is quite winning in a story that hinges on the acceptability of adultery. He and Rossellini share a chemistry lacking in many modern romances.