Best or Worst War Movies of All Time

[pkpowers]

here are 2 more I highly commend

12 o clock high

Murphys war

[flibby]

I can't bear to watch Patton. The use of M47s rather than Shermans literally makes it unwatchable for me. Am i missing out?

[flibby]

double post

[wesy]

"Fires on the Plain" by Kon Ichikawa. This is a film about the disorganized retreat from Leyte Gulf by the IJA. Focuses on a Company (essentially reduced to a platoon).

[RangerJoe]

ORIGINAL: flibby

I can't bear to watch Patton. The use of M47s rather than Shermans literally makes it unwatchable for me. Am i missing out?

Yes, you are. The Spanish Army did not have Shermans at all that I know of so they had to use what they had. Consider that and watch it with an open mind.

Joe

[Platoonist]

ORIGINAL: flibby

I can't bear to watch Patton. The use of M47s rather than Shermans literally makes it unwatchable for me. Am i missing out?

It's a great performance by George C. Scott. [8D]

You have to put yourself in the economics of the time the movie was made. A local army where a movie was being staged was the simplest and most economical source for tanks to be used in films in the 1960s. Patton was primarily filmed in Spain. Very expensive to be shipping Shermans or other rare legacy tanks (if you can find enough of them) around the Mediterranean. So the film makers used the Spanish Army’s US-made Patton M48s to simulate General Rommel’s tanks and M-47s for General Patton's tanks. This was not a great accuracy choice by today’s film making standards, as the M48 is enormous compared to Rommel’s workhorses: the Pz III and Pz IV’s. But people, let’s be real…that movie was filmed in 1970, well before medium or high military accuracy became a thing for war movie audiences. Most people were content just to see tanks rolling around and stuff exploding. The movie-makers (quite correctly at the time) assumed the average moviegoer would not be able to tell the tanks apart anyway, so why bother with realism when a big, black balkenkreuz painted on a turret was enough to identify the bad guys?

I think the change for realism finally started to come in the 1970s. The movie Kelly's Hero's was filmed primarily in Yugoslavia because their army still had Sherman tanks in their possession to play the role of Sherman tanks. However, the German Tigers in the film were actually modified Soviet T-34 tanks. In A Bridge too Far, the Tiger tanks used by Germany’s 9th SS and 10th SS Panzer divisions at Arnhem were actually thinly disguised Leopard I tanks that didn’t enter service until 1965. There were British Shermans, but only four actual Sherman tanks appear in the film. The rest were just plastic molds set on top of a VW Beetle chassis. Ironic when you think about it.

[Pvt_Grunt]

I will put emotional impact ahead of historical accuracy............at the risk of losing Grog points
A good movie set during war time can be "better" than a good movie that perfectly depicts a war.
After all, war is 99% waiting and 1% fighting right? Not a great movie.......

SO
1) - Band of Brothers (not technically a movie I know)
2) - Saving Private Ryan (a good movie set during a war) (is this the film who will not be named?)
3) - Shindlers list
4) - Downfall
5) - Das Boot - hard to watch but great movie
6) - 1917
7) - Hacksaw Ridge - I hate Mel Gibson as a person but I enjoyed this movie
8) - Gallipoli - I can still feel the emotions of THAT final scene 35 years after I saw it.

[loki100]

but .. but .. no one is mentioning the ultimate POW movie - Chicken Run

[wesy]

Taiheiyô kiseki no sakusen: Kisuka (1965) - In Japanese, but a really good movie about the Japanese evacuation of Kiska.

In 1943, the Aleutian island of Kiska, Alaska was fortified by a small contingent of Japanese soldiers. When word arrived of an impending attack by an overwhelming force of Americans, the Japanese Navy attempted one of the most daring and unlikely evacuations in military history.

Great historical quote: Admiral Ernest King reported to Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox that the only things found on Kiska when it was recovered were dogs and freshly brewed coffee. When Knox asked for an explanation, King is said to have responded, "The Japanese are very clever. Their dogs can brew coffee."

[Platoonist]

ORIGINAL: wesy



Great historical quote: Admiral Ernest King reported to Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox that the only things found on Kiska when it was recovered were dogs and freshly brewed coffee. When Knox asked for an explanation, King is said to have responded, "The Japanese are very clever. Their dogs can brew coffee."

The man actually had a sense of humor? From everything I've read about King he comes across as pretty stern and stony.

On being tapped to be CINCUS, King was widely reputed throughout the Navy to have said, “When they get in trouble, they send for the sons of bitches.” When asked near the end of the war if he really said that, King replied that he hadn't, but if he had thought of it, he would have.

[OldSarge]

Another great WW1 movie to put on the list of movies worth watching is The Lighthorsemen

It is about the charge of two regiments of Australian Light Horse against the Turkish forces at Beersheba in the Palestine on October 31st, 1917. The main cavalry charge is interesting, everybody at the time knew light horse (mounted infantry) didn't charge dug-in infantry positions! It starts around 1:29:00.

Here is the Wiki entry for the battle: Battle of Beersheba (1917)

[Rising-Sun]

That new Midway is okay, but flashy. They left out few important features in that movie. The other Midway (Charlton Heston and Henry Fonda) i remember reading and seeing this, that the bomber groups was using auto switch to armed those bombs and they fell away to the ocean. So they had to switch to manually.

I have a list of my favorite (they are WWII)...
1)In Harm's Way (John Wayne)
2)Letters from Iwo Jima & Flags of our Fathers by eastwood
3)The Longest Day (John Wayne)
4)The Admiral
5)Yamato
6)Saving Private Ryan
7)Das Boot
8)Pearl Harbor
9)and Kelly's Heroes

[RangerJoe]

ORIGINAL: Platoonist

ORIGINAL: wesy



Great historical quote: Admiral Ernest King reported to Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox that the only things found on Kiska when it was recovered were dogs and freshly brewed coffee. When Knox asked for an explanation, King is said to have responded, "The Japanese are very clever. Their dogs can brew coffee."

The man actually had a sense of humor? From everything I've read about King he comes across as pretty stern and stony.

On being tapped to be CINCUS, King was widely reputed throughout the Navy to have said, “When they get in trouble, they send for the sons of bitches.” When asked near the end of the war if he really said that, King replied that he hadn't, but if he had thought of it, he would have.

He did not become Sink US, he became COMINCH.

[RangerJoe]

War movie? Would Kramer vs Kramer count?

[the dragon]

Two good oldies(because I'm old) Both WWII.

1- Battleground(1949) b&w, 101st AB at Bastogne. Won Academy Awards for story & screenplay. Nominated for Best Picture & Director.

2- A Walk in the Sun(1945) b&w, Platoon action in Italy.

Both are excellent & last I looked were on the IMDb website.

Don't let b & w put you off. It is a lot better than outdated graphics in computer games.

[goodwoodrw]

There are a lot war movies that worth watching and for different reasons, technical aspect, historical, and just pure entertainment, plus other reasons. My favourite movies in no particular order, are Where Eagles Dare, The Great Escape, SPR, The Light horsemen,The Longest Day, BOB and a Bridge to Far. I saw Dunkirk at an Imax theatre, the sound and large screen made the movie a special experience. All movies are about enjoyment and entertainment. Back to Dunkirk, one of my all time favourite movie scenes is when the brits are hiding in the beached small boat and the gunfire penetrates the steel hull, the sound frightened the crapper out of me.

[warspite1]

ORIGINAL: goodwoodrw

There are a lot war movies that worth watching and for different reasons, technical aspect, historical, and just pure entertainment, plus other reasons...... I saw Dunkirk at an Imax theatre, the sound and large screen made the movie a special experience. All movies are about enjoyment and entertainment. Back to Dunkirk, one of my all time favourite movie scenes is when the brits are hiding in the beached small boat and the gunfire penetrates the steel hull, the sound frightened the crapper out of me.

warspite1

I'd agree with that and certainly the point about the scene in Dunkirk.

I recall seeing as a kid a program - I don't think it was a film, it might have been a play. I recall there was a small group of British soldiers in a hut (must have been Malaya). It was night time, they were surrounded by the Japanese, and they were closing in. I remember this scene because it really affected me at the time. The actors brilliantly conveyed their fear of what was to come. If I remember rightly we don't see what happens - just a lot of shouting, screaming and gunfire. Horrific.

[Eambar]

Some interesting movies presented so far - I've come up with my top 10 -

Come and See (1985)
Trial on the Road (1971)
The Beast (also known as the Beast of War)- one of the few English language movies made about the Soviets in Afghanistan (1988)
Stalingrad - the German 1993 version
Downfall (2004)
Afghan Breakdown (1991) Soviets in Afghanistan
Liberation - actually a series of shorter films, made by the Soviets in 1970/71
The Wall (2017)
Hurt Locker (2008)
Apocalypse Now (1979)

There aren't too many that I would not recommend, if I had to choose one, it would be Enemy at the Gates (2001). Watch it back to back with Stalingrad to see why.

Cheers

[Simulacra53]

Few movies imho stand the test of time, at least not in their entirety, scenes sure.
Some favorites of mine in no particular order

Das Boot
Conspiracy TV
The Apocalypse Now
Platoon
Letters from Vietnam TV
The Hurt Locker
Tora Tora Tora
The Longest Day
The Hill
Cross of Iron
Indigènes
The Beast (of War)
Tumbledown
A Piece of Cake TV
Over Here TV
Dad’s Army TV
It ain’t half hot mum TV
Soldaat van Oranje
Band of Brothers TV
Hell in the Pacific
Kelly’s Heroes
MASH
Jarhead
The Blue Max (love hate with book, but Peppard is very good in the movie)
12 o’Clock High!
...etcetera

The list is long, it just needs a scene or to that stick.

[Simulacra53]

Yeah...

Der Untergang
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