Great movies about wartime reality
'You'll pretend you were men instead of babies, and you'll be played in the movies by Frank Sinatra and John Wayne or some of those other glamorous, war-loving, dirty old men. And war will look just wonderful, so we'll have a lot more of them. And they'll be fought by babies like the babies upstairs.'
[...]
"I give you my word of honor: there won't be a part for Frank Sinatra or John Wayne. 'I tell you what,' I said, 'I'll call it The Children's Crusade."
Kurt Vonnegut: Slaughterhouse Five
[...]
"I give you my word of honor: there won't be a part for Frank Sinatra or John Wayne. 'I tell you what,' I said, 'I'll call it The Children's Crusade."
Kurt Vonnegut: Slaughterhouse Five
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- DirectorSrdjan DragojevicStarsDragan BjelogrlicNikola KojoDragan MaksimovicDuring the war in Bosnia, two childhood friends eventually become enemies, as the tragic and devastating circumstances of the war put them on the opposite sides and expose the most gruesome and cruel aspects of the human nature.The most haunting war movie of my life.
Shot in 1995, DURING the Bosnian war.
8% of the population of Serbia watched this movie in cinemas...
(Serbian cinema) - DirectorElem KlimovStarsAleksey KravchenkoOlga MironovaLiubomiras LauceviciusAfter finding an old rifle, a young boy joins the Soviet resistance movement against ruthless German forces and experiences the horrors of World War II.Unforgettable images and life stories from Belarus during WW 2.
(Soviet cinema) - DirectorSteven SpielbergStarsTom HanksMatt DamonTom SizemoreFollowing the Normandy Landings, a group of U.S. soldiers go behind enemy lines to retrieve a paratrooper whose brothers have been killed in action.An absolute classic of war movies.
(US cinema) - DirectorGrigoriy ChukhrayStarsVladimir IvashovZhanna ProkhorenkoAntonina MaksimovaYoung Russian soldier Alyosha earns a medal, but asks to visit his mother instead. His journey recounts various kinds of love during wartime.Soviet soldier asks to visit his mother instead of a medal for bravery.
(Soviet cinema) - DirectorRajko GrlicStarsToni GojanovicSergej TrifunovicEmir HadzihafizbegovicA small border post on the Yugoslav-Albanian border in the spring of 1987. Frustrated and always drunk, lieutenant Pasic feels a strange pain in his groins. He seeks help from the only doctor among the soldiers, Sinisa, who diagnoses a sexually transmitted disease. Not wishing his wife to know about it and trying to find excuses not to go home, he declares a state of emergency, claiming that the Albanian army is preparing an attack against Yugoslavia. A joke transforms into war hysteria: soldiers dig trenches, Pasic grows wilder as the days go by, Sinisa embarks on a dangerous liaison, and his best friend Ljuba decides to leave the army. The situation slowly runs out of control...Life in a small border post between Yugoslavia and Albania in 1987.
(Croatian cinema) - DirectorFrancis Ford CoppolaStarsMartin SheenMarlon BrandoRobert DuvallA U.S. Army officer serving in Vietnam is tasked with assassinating a renegade Special Forces Colonel who sees himself as a god.Something else...
A most possible pacifist statement in itself
(US cinema) - DirectorAleksandr RogozhkinStarsAnni-Kristiina JuusoVille HaapasaloViktor BychkovIn World War II, a Finnish sniper is left chained to a rock by German soldiers, while a captain of the Red Army, en route to his court martial, is almost blown up by Russian planes. A Lapp woman gives shelter to both of them at her farm.A quite unknown movie set in Lappland. Wartime drama with unheard-of language barriers.
(Russian cinema) - DirectorLouis MalleStarsPierre BlaiseAurore ClémentHolger LöwenadlerIn 1944, an 18-year-old boy from small-town France collaborates with the Gestapo and subsequently falls in love with a Jewish girl.A flawless movie about everyday life in Vichy France in 1944 seen through many different characters let them be collaborators, Jews, resistance fighters - or a restless adolescent from a village.
A masterpiece of film-making and a story about reality - and the banality of evil... - DirectorAgnieszka HollandStarsSolomon PerelMarco HofschneiderRené HofschneiderA boy in Nazi Germany, trying to conceal that he is Jewish, joins the Hitler Youth.A young Jewish boy tries to survive WW2 by joining Hitlerjugend
(German-Polish-French cinema) - DirectorAri FolmanStarsAri FolmanRon Ben-YishaiRonny DayagAn Israeli film director interviews fellow veterans of the 1982 invasion of Lebanon to reconstruct his own memories of his term of service in that conflict.If you are to watch one Israeli movie in your life let this be it.
Incredible ways of depicting haunting stories.
(Israeli cinema) - DirectorAdrian LyneStarsTim RobbinsElizabeth PeñaDanny AielloMourning his dead child, a haunted Vietnam War veteran attempts to uncover his past while suffering from a severe case of dissociation. To do so, he must decipher reality and life from his own dreams, delusions, and perceptions of death.A darkest take on what's going on in the head of a Vietnam veteran soldier
(US cinema) - DirectorEmir KusturicaStarsPredrag 'Miki' ManojlovicLazar RistovskiMirjana JokovicTwo underground black marketeers, Marko and Blacky, sell weapons to the Communist resistance in wartime Belgrade, living the good life along the way.War in Yugoslavia in WW II and in the 1990s.
(Serbian cinema) - DirectorDanis TanovicStarsBranko DjuricRene BitorajacFilip SovagovicBosnia and Herzegovina during 1993 at the time of the heaviest fighting between the two warring sides. Two soldiers from opposing sides in the conflict, Nino and Ciki, become trapped in no man's land, whilst a third soldier becomes a living booby trap.Bosnian War, UN peacekeepers and a powerful message about the futility of war.
(Bosnian cinema) - DirectorIsao TakahataStarsTsutomu TatsumiAyano ShiraishiAkemi YamaguchiA young boy and his little sister struggle to survive in Japan during World War II.On of the most moving story of children during war.
(Japanese cinema) - DirectorChuan LuStarsYe LiuWei FanHideo NakaizumiIn 1937, Japan occupied Nanjing, the Chinese capital. There was a battle and subsequent atrocities against the inhabitants, especially those who took refuge in the International Security Zone.War is no fun.
Neither in Europe nor in the Far-East.
Occupation is no fun either.
Haunting human stories. - DirectorJoachim RønningEspen SandbergStarsAksel HennieAgnes KittelsenNicolai Cleve BrochThe true story about one of the most brilliant saboteurs during World War II and his battle to overcome his inner demons.The story of Norvegian resistance fighter Max Manus.
(Norvegian cinema) - DirectorOle Christian MadsenStarsThure LindhardtMads MikkelsenStine StengadeA drama centered on two fighters in the Holger Danske World War II resistance group.It's incredible how great movies are made in Europe about resistance during WW2 and how little-known they remain.
(Danish cinema) - DirectorPaul VerhoevenStarsCarice van HoutenSebastian KochThom HoffmanIn the Nazi-occupied Netherlands during World War II, a Jewish singer infiltrates the regional Gestapo headquarters for the Dutch resistance.The Dutch did it too: another European nation to tell another forgotten story of WW 2 resistance.
(Dutch cinema) - DirectorPaul VerhoevenStarsRutger HauerJeroen KrabbéSusan PenhaligonDuring World War II, Dutch students join the resistance movement against the German occupation of the Netherlands.Occupied Netherlands in WW2.
Choices whether to fight or no and if yes, on whose side are not easy and black-and-white as we'd think.
Stories of young friends finding themselves in a world with wartime choices to make.
(Dutch cinema) - DirectorJean-Pierre MelvilleStarsLino VenturaPaul MeurisseJean-Pierre CasselAn account of underground resistance fighters in Nazi-occupied France.Resistance fighters in occupied France under Nazi rule during WW2.
(French cinema) - DirectorRoberto RosselliniStarsAnna MagnaniAldo FabriziMarcello PaglieroDuring the Nazi occupation of Rome in 1944, the Resistance leader, Giorgio Manfredi, is chased by the Nazis as he seeks refuge and a way to escape.What better time to make a war movie than 1945?
(Italian cinema) - DirectorLewis MilestoneStarsLew AyresLouis WolheimJohn WrayA German youth eagerly enters World War I, but his enthusiasm wanes as he gets a firsthand view of the horror.An American epic film that's considered a realistic and harrowing account of warfare in World War I
(US cinema) - DirectorJean RenoirStarsJean GabinDita ParloPierre FresnayDuring WWI, two French soldiers are captured and imprisoned in a German P.O.W. camp. Several escape attempts follow until they are eventually sent to a seemingly inescapable fortress.One of the most powerful war movies made before 1945.
(French cinema) - DirectorStanley KubrickStarsKirk DouglasRalph MeekerAdolphe MenjouAfter a failed attack on a German position, a general orders three soldiers, chosen at random, court-martialed for cowardice and their commanding officer must defend them.One of the few great movies made about WWI and trench warfare.
In 1969, Kirk Douglas recalled about the film "There's a picture that will always be good, years from now. I don't have to wait 50 years to know that; I know it now".
He was right...
(US cinema) - DirectorPekka ParikkaStarsTaneli MäkeläVesa VierikkoTimo TorikkaIn 1939, two Finnish brothers are conscripted in the army to fight in the war between Finland and the Soviet Union.Finland, Winter war 1939-1940.
The film focuses on Finnish farmers going to war.
(Finnish cinema)