The Thin Red Line
Bridge On The River Kwai
Lawrence of Arabia
Apocalypse Now
Shop On Main Street
The Cranes Are Flying
Battle of Algiers
The Big Red One
MASH
The Good, The Bad & The Ugly (civil war so it counts)
Full Metal Jacket
Traffic (war on drugs – it counts too)
RE: ROB; SOYBEAN,
Hey lads, thanks for bringing up “Wooden Crosses”. I’ve actually seen it on tape many years ago. I don’t know how I managed to forget to put that on my list (maybe the French title confused me a bit) since it was a great film with technically brilliant battle sequences and powerful scenes, esp the one in the church filled with wounded men. I remembered even recommending it to friends over Pabst’s “1918 Westfront”. Hopefully it is out on dvd somewhere ‘cause I agree it’s a masterpiece. And no, being preachy doesn’t really make a war film any less better, for me anyway. Wars are always tragic and quite frankly, a personal misfortune to those involved that neither politics nor technology could change.
Apologies if I overlooked it, but: “Die Brugge” (The Bridge) , Directed by Bernhard Vicki. German boys in a last stand for a bridge in Germany as American troops approach.
Not quite war films in the traditional sense of the genre, but:
TUNES OF GLORY
and
SOLDIER IN THE RAIN
The two best films about army life.
CROSS OF IRON
Apocalypse Now, Full Metal Jacket, Overlord, Thin Red Line and the first 30 minutes of Saving Private Ryan (the rest of the film blows and can be scrapped), Das Boot, Army of Shadows
Letters From Iwo Jima
Platoon
Glory
Full Metal Jacket
Grave of the Fireflies
Flags of our Fathers
1) The Full Metal Jacket, From Stanley Kubrick.
2) Platoon, from Oliver Stone
3) Apocalypsis Now, From Coppola
Das Boot and Zulu are pretty good war movies
Waltz With Bashir
The Hurt Locker -my two favs
has anyone said anything about the Deerhunter ?
I’m sorry but it’s as good as Apocalypse Now and much better than Saving private Ryan…
has anyone said anything about the Deerhunter ?
I’m sorry but it’s as good as Apocalypse Now and much better than Saving private Ryan…
Ruteboeuf, Deer Hunter has been mentioned and yes I agree it is better than Saving Private Ryan.
Ballad of a Soldier, Patton, and Full Metal Jacket all had interesting perspectives on war.
The Battle of Algiers is probably the best war movie, despite me preferring Apocalypse Now….if that makes sense.
I think because there have been so many war films, they all have different purposes in showing war.
War as Poetry – The Thin Red Line
War as Madness – Apocalypse Now
War as It Is – The Ascent, Platoon and the first 20 minutes of Saving Private Ryan
Of course, there’s also the incomparable Bridge on the River Kwai and Lawrence of Arabia.
Windtalkers is my guilty pleasure.
I think we should define once and for all what exactly counts as a “war movie.” I’ve been seeing some pretty wonky stuff. Movies like Grave of the Fireflies which take place during (a) war but that aren’t actually movies of war I think should be excluded from the running. “War on drugs” does not count as “war,” sorry. “War” in this sense is only a rhetorical device. Like I said, I think that so far as we’re discussing “war films,” I don’t think we should be talking about films which don’t actually involve or show war at all or in any case only show war minoritarily. The Grave of the Fireflies (for instance) while one of my all time favourites, isn’t exactly a “war” film. There’s alot more going on there. For a film to be a “war movie” in my oppinion, the principal subject of the film should be war and or mans relation to war etc. Even movies like Bridge on the River Kwai and Lawrence of Arabia would be on the edge in my oppinion. The latter I think might even fall into the “epic” category.
…sorry if I’ve been repeating myself.
Full Metal Jacket..
“Saving Private Ryan is almost as bad as Pearl Harbour, not insightful” un fucking believable
more emotional scar than a movie, it was like watching a horror film. battle scenes
are absolutely terrifying and engaging. THE best war film
other two are Black Hawk Down and Full Metal Jacket
@Micky_Ward: …you don’t get out much, do you? The former two are Hollywood blockbusters and the latter is widely misinterpreted by young people. the best war movies “imho” is Zulu (1969?).
how insightful you are, you can read people from their posts.
blockbusters or not they are best crafted war films along the latter one, the one we youngsters don’t understand.
Damn, right! Get off my lawn! (which I’ll have in 20 or 30 years when I decide to tie myself down with a mortgage).
computer nerds are like that
Top 10
Apocalypse Now
Downfall
Das Boot
Air Force
The Desert Rats
Battleground
Saving Private Ryan
Sink The Bismark
The Thin Red Line (original)
Platoon
Video games are better at war than movies.
The Steel Helmet
Friendly Persuasion by William Wyler has to be one of the best war movies of all time.
Dishcloth
Has anyone already mentioned ‘Forbidden Games’ and ‘Grave of the Fireflies’? Really good war movies, they don’t really deal with combat explicitly but they had a bigger impact on me than movies like Saving Private Ryan, The Deer Hunter and such.