Top War Movies – IOTW Report

Top War Movies

Monday, 28 May 2018, 14:00 MJA Uncategorized 58

Breitbart has a list:

With Memorial Day weekend upon us, patriots may want to spend a few hours remembering some of our greatest war films. Here we will talk briefly about over thirty war films. Some stir the patriot’s blood, others are amusing, many harrowing, still more are foreboding with a subtle anti-war message.

While everyone has their own favorites list — and yours may not be here — all presented here are a great watch.

On that list, my favorites were The Bridge Over the River Kwai  and Band of Brothers .

58 Comments on Top War Movies

  1. It’s an extensive list, but the commenters found a few missing gems.

    TCM ran Battleground (1949) this morning. An earlier take on the 101st Airborne at Bastogne. I recommend it as a fairly accurate film.

    7

  3. I would add the more recent film “Lone Survivor” about Marcus Luttrell and his SEAL Team in Afghanistan. I’ve watched that movie four times since December. And I still actually scream and sob like a woman in some parts of it. But it is such a powerful story of friendship, loyalty, and against-the-odds willingness to fight. As heart-wrenching as it is at times, it is an amazing film.

    I plan to watch that, plus “American Sniper” and “13 Hours” today. And if I have time, I’m also going to watch “Zero Dark Thirty.”

    14

  4. From that list:

    BOWK – one of the best endings of ANY movie. Period.
    The Great Escape – Tom, Dick and Harry!
    Glory – amazing story

    Not on the list:

    The Deer Hunter – more about relationships than war.
    Platoon –
    Paths of Glory – early Kubrick WW1 movie
    Run Silent Run Deep – WWII sub movie
    A Bridge Too Far
    The Crossing – Washington at Trenton, I highly recommend.

    8

  5. Good list, most of these war movies I’ve seen. I own the Band of Brothers videos which I watch every yr. in the Winter for the episodes dealing with the Battle of The Bulge, Gettysburg is my favorite Civil War movie, the scenes depicting Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain and the 20th Maine warding off the Confederates at Little Round Top (fix bayonets and charge into the enemy) are incredible. We Were Soldiers is the best Vietnam movie. All good movies but they missed The Train with Burt Lancaster. And is The Manchurian Candidate a war movie or a suspense thriller or both? I also like the Purple Heart with Dana Andrews. And the story of GI Joe about Ernie Pyle is a great one also. And Larry shut the hell up and quit annoying us with your asinine comments.

    9

  8. 12 O’Clock High should also be on the list.

    The essence of a good war movie is not about the action, but about people having to face difficult times and doing what they need to do. With that in mind, perhaps Seven Samurai could also be on the list.

    11

  12. Larry is not a woman and shouldn’t APPROPRIATE our sex or values.

    I am a woman, and if women and gay men ran the world, it would just as violent, but people would be more sneaky about it. Humans are humans, regardless of sex. Women are not better than men, only different, and gay men are really different!

    10

  13. Kelly’s Heros…

    Enemy at the Gate

    Stalingrad (1993)

    Stalingrad (2013)

    Das Hammer (German U boat story) Brietbart lists this Das Boot
    When I saw it, it was titled Das Hammer

    The Bridge at Remagen

    Fury (2014}

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  18. I watched “Kelly’s Heros” on TCM last night. Whenever it and “GalaxyQuest” are on, I stop and watch them. Hard to believe that Kelly’s Heros was made in 1970 – 48 years ago, still stands the test of time. I also love the end, where Clint Eastwood, Telly Savalas and another guy walk down the street towards the German Panzer tank to the music from “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly”.

    5

  20. I’m not saying it is but “M*a*s*h*” was always one of my favorites.

    I remember the Captain of the ship I was on debating with department heads about showing it. Not going to tell you which one but a buddy and I (who served TDY on another ship) provided navigational augmentation to a certain aircraft carrier called ourselves “the pros from Glover.”

    5

  27. Chris Kyle’s Murderer wasn’t a PTSD Victim…He never even saw

    Combat..He was a nutcase Who’s Mom talked Chris into helping

    Him (Rant over)

    Love Mel Gibson Movies…But the Patriot was a stinker.

    3

  30. I love them all.
    Some are accurate.
    Some are a little more Hollywood.
    Some are VERY Hollywood.
    But what they show is the sacrifice that these men made.
    God love and embrace these men and women who gave the last full measure…….

    6

  31. No one mentioned any John Wayne war movies except for The Longest Day which he was in. The Green Berets anyone before we knew Mr. Sulu was gay.

    4

  32. Have seen them all.
    From the list:
    Most liked, Sargent York
    Least liked, MASH
    Most admired, Hacksaw Ridge
    Most like reality, BoB
    Darkest, Dirty Dozen
    Missing and should be there, Unbroken
    Angelina Jolie, director, who knew?

    4

  34. @OpenTheDoor May 28, 2018 at 4:18 pm

    Unbroken, without doubt should be on the list. Directed by Angelina Jolie. I didn’t think she had it in her, but she did a great job.

    The Thin Red Line. Little remembered movie. Excellent action sequences throughout, especially of a US squad going uphill to take out a Japanese machine gun nest.

    Gettysburg – the highlight IMO is the awesome physical clash as Pickett’s soldiers hit the fence that the union soldiers were manning. Brilliantly staged and photographed.

    Platoon – should have been on the list for technical accuracy, at least. No need to buy Stone’s politics to enjoy it.

    3

  36. My 10 top favorites of old in no particular order are the original Sahara, Longest Day, Kelly’s Heroes, Bridge on River Kwai, Stalag 17, Midway, Platoon, Great Escape, The Bridge at Remagen and Patton, though I love em all.

    For the more modern movies, if the Patriot is on, I will watch it like its the first time. Fury, Saving Private Ryan are also favorites.

    Also while its just Sci-fi, the 1953 War of the Worlds would be on the top of the list. The Cruise remake was ruined because of the idiotic notion the Martians just buried their war machines on Earth 1000’s of years before humans had evolved. Then decide to attack by lightning bolting the martians through the ground into the war machines so they could surface. What was Speilberg thinking??????

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  37. @ghost of col j glover May 28, 2018 at 2:31 pm

    Paths of Glory – absolutely.

    The Deer Hunter – Robert DeNiro and Meryl Streep. No way. Like you said, relationships.

    1

  39. Das Boot, Fury, the Chris Kyle movie & Saving Private Ryan

    Two more whose titles I don’t recall – the 2 Clint Eastwood movies about Iwo Jima , one from American POV , the other the Japanese POV .

    3

  42. A huge disappointment for me was “Enemy at the Gates”. The book was damned good, but the movie was crapped up with a dumb and unnecessary love story.

    Romances destroy what would otherwise be excellent war movies.

    3

  44. Although not a movie, someone posted a link a few days ago to an excellent Youtube series called The Great War. If you are a history buff, check it out. 563 episodes that cover WWI in exquisite detail.

    1

  45. Here are some really great British World War II war movies that often get overlooked by people making these lists:
    In Which We Serve
    The Cruel Sea
    The Dam Busters
    Ice Cold In Alex
    Battle of Britain
    Dunkirk
    The Way Ahead
    The Wooden Horse
    We Dive At Dawn
    The Way To The Stars
    The Captive Heart
    Theirs Is The Glory
    Reach For The Sky
    The Cockleshell Heroes
    The Battle Of The River Platte
    Carve Her Name With Pride
    Ill Met By Moonlight

    And a couple of really great Australian war movies:
    Breaker Morant
    Gallipoli

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  46. how could anyone miss ‘Pork Chop Hill’?
    a few more not mentioned: The Big Red One, 1941, Gods And Generals, The Alamo, Rio Grande, Fort Apache, She Wore A Yellow Ribbon, The Flying Tigers, Zulu, Waterloo (w/ Rod Steiger & Christopher Plumber)

    big fan of the old ‘Combat!’ show w/ Vic Morrow (although not a movie)

    2

  49. Bcattin: Breaker Morant will really make you dislike the British. It’s one of the best movies ever made about the British Empire. Very factual. Still causes an uproar in Australia whenever the facts are questioned by the British. “Shoot straight, you bastards!” were actually the Breaker’s last words before he and Handcock were shot by a British firing squad during the Boer War. Sacrificed for Empire. Probably the best movie ever made about the injustices of irregular warfare.

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  52. @TB2 ~ a big disappointment for me was the book “Enemy At The Gates” … the author did a yeoman’s job on reporting, but it was terribly repetitious & from the little he gleaned from Soviet sources, read like a bad Russian translation & sounded very juvenile … (particularly the Vasily Zaytsev & his lover-sniper girl … ironically the only part that the movie was based on) … & the maps were horrible & too few for the scope of the battle (maybe it was just my edition; even the paper had yellowed!)

  53. I’m not sure if this qualifies as a war movie. But I had a rare couple days off and the “Sons Of Liberty” was on. An eight hour event. I never moved out of my recliner. Well maybe once. If you have not seen it, you need to.

  55. @Bongopoofter May 28, 2018 at 2:46 pm

    Here is an interesting scene that I remember from Sahara:

    Bogart asks the French soldier if he wanted to stay with the allied team or surrender to the German side The French soldier says something like: “I’ll stay..I like your American cigarettes”.

    It sums up in a single sentence the ambiguity of which side the French were on. He apparently stayed only for the American cigarettes, and nothing else.

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  56. @OpenTheDoor May 28, 2018 at 4:18 pm

    Speaking of MASH, I walked out after 10 minutes (1970, I believe). Never watched even one of the series installments on TV. I had no interest at all in following it.

  57. “The General Died at Dawn”(ca 1936), was maybe not technically a war movie, more about far eastern political intrigue, but the title is dramatic and makes one want to find out what happened.

    Gary Cooper was in it, I think. So was William Frawley, who became Fred Mertz in I Love Lucy in the 1950’s.

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