World War Two
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Casablanca (1943)
Directed by Michael Curtiz, starring Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid. Critics Consensus: An undisputed masterpiece and perhaps Hollywood's quintessential statement on love and romance, Casablanca has only...
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Fury (2014)
Directed by David Ayer, starring Brad Pitt, Shia LaBeouf, Logan Lerman. Critics Consensus: Overall, Fury is a well-acted, suitably raw depiction of the horrors of war that offers visceral battle scenes but...
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Midway (2019)
Directed by Roland Emmerich, starring Ed Skrein, Patrick Wilson, Woody Harrelson. Critics Consensus: Midway revisits a well-known story with modern special effects and a more balanced point of view, but its screenplay...
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Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Directed by Quentin Tarantino, starring Brad Pitt, Mélanie Laurent, Christoph Waltz. Critics Consensus: A classic Tarantino genre-blending thrill ride, Inglourious Basterds is violent, unrestrained, and thoroughly...
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The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare (2024)
Directed by Guy Ritchie, starring Henry Cavill, Eiza González, Alan Ritchson. Critics Consensus: Cranking up a true story of derring-do into a high-octane action flick that's heavy on spectacle if not suspense, The...
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Oppenheimer (2023)
Directed by Christopher Nolan, starring Cillian Murphy, Emily Blunt, Matt Damon. Critics Consensus: Oppenheimer marks another engrossing achievement from Christopher Nolan that benefits from Murphy's tour-de-force...
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Downfall (2004)
Directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel, starring Bruno Ganz, Alexandra Maria Lara, Corinna Harfouch. Critics Consensus: Downfall is an illuminating, thoughtful and detailed account of Hitler's last days.
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Enemy at the Gates (2001)
Directed by Jean-Jacques Annaud, starring Jude Law, Joseph Fiennes, Rachel Weisz. Critics Consensus: Atmospheric and thrilling, Enemy at the Gates gets the look and feel of war right. However, the love story seems out of...
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The Thin Red Line (1998)
Directed by Terrence Malick, starring Jim Caviezel, Nick Nolte, Sean Penn. Critics Consensus: The Thin Red Line is a daringly philosophical World War II film with an enormous cast of eager stars.
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Allied (2016)
Directed by Robert Zemeckis, starring Brad Pitt, Marion Cotillard, Jared Harris. Overview: In 1942, a Canadian intelligence officer and a French Resistance fighter fall in love during a mission in Casablanca,...
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Stalag 17 (1953)
Directed by Billy Wilder, starring William Holden, Robert Strauss, Don Taylor. Critics Consensus: Stalag 17 survives the jump from stage to screen with flying colors, thanks to Billy Wilder's typically sterling...
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Defiance (2008)
Directed by Edward Zwick, starring Daniel Craig, Liev Schreiber, Jamie Bell. Critics Consensus: Professionally made but artistically uninspired, Ed Zwick's story of Jews surviving WWII in the Belarus forest lacks the...
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The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
Directed by David Lean, starring William Holden, Alec Guinness, Jack Hawkins. Critics Consensus: This complex war epic asks hard questions, resists easy answers, and boasts career-defining work from star Alec Guinness...
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From Here to Eternity (1953)
Directed by Fred Zinnemann, starring Burt Lancaster, Montgomery Clift, Deborah Kerr. Critics Consensus: It has perhaps aged poorly, but this languidly paced WWII romance remains an iconic, well-acted film, featuring...
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The Great Escape (1963)
Directed by John Sturges, starring Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard Attenborough. Critics Consensus: With its impeccably slow-building story and a cast for the ages, The Great Escape is an all-time action classic.
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Patton (1970)
Directed by Franklin J. Schaffner, starring George C. Scott, Stephen Young, Frank Latimore. Critics Consensus: George C. Scott's sympathetic, unflinching portrayal of the titular general in this sprawling epic is as definitive as...
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The Caine Mutiny (1954)
Directed by Edward Dmytryk, starring Humphrey Bogart, Robert Francis, Van Johnson. Critics Consensus: Humphrey Bogart is superb as a domineering captain with brittle composure in The Caine Mutiny, an inquisitive courtroom...
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Where Eagles Dare (1968)
Directed by Brian G. Hutton, starring Richard Burton, Clint Eastwood, Mary Ure. Critics Consensus: A thrilling and action-packed World War II adventure, praised for its complex twists and the star power of Richard...
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5 Fingers (1952)
Directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz, starring James Mason, Danielle Darrieux, Michael Rennie. Overview: During WWII, a British ambassador's ambitious valet in neutral Turkey sells top-secret Allied documents to the Germans,...
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To Be or Not to Be (1942)
Directed by Ernst Lubitsch, starring Carole Lombard, Jack Benny, Robert Stack. Critics Consensus: A complex and timely satire with as much darkness as slapstick, Ernst Lubitsch's To Be or Not To Be delicately balances...
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The Wings of Eagles (1957)
Directed by John Ford, starring John Wayne, Dan Dailey, Maureen O'Hara. Overview: The story of Frank W. "Spig" Wead - a Navy-flyer turned screenwriter.
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Mister Roberts (1955)
Directed by John Ford, Mervyn LeRoy, starring Henry Fonda, James Cagney, William Powell. Overview: Mr. Roberts is a Navy officer who's yearning for battle but is stuck in the backwaters of World War II on a...
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Alone in Berlin (2016)
Directed by Vincent Perez, starring Emma Thompson, Brendan Gleeson, Daniel Brühl. Overview: A working-class couple in Nazi Berlin start a secret, solitary campaign of resistance against the regime after their son...
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The Dirty Dozen (1967)
Directed by Robert Aldrich, starring Lee Marvin, Ernest Borgnine, Charles Bronson. Overview: During WWII, a US Army major recruits twelve convicted murderers to undertake a suicide mission behind enemy lines in...
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Operation Mincemeat (2022)
Directed by John Madden, starring Colin Firth, Matthew Macfadyen, Kelly Macdonald. Critics Consensus: If its fact-based story proves more fascinatingly outlandish than it's presented here, Operation Mincemeat remains an...
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Captain Corelli's Mandolin (2001)
Directed by John Madden, starring Nicolas Cage, Penélope Cruz, John Hurt. Overview: When a fisherman leaves to fight with the Greek army during World War II, his fiancée falls in love with the local...
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Pearl Harbor (2001)
Directed by Michael Bay, starring Ben Affleck, Kate Beckinsale, Josh Hartnett. Critics Consensus: Pearl Harbor tries to be the Titanic of war movies, but it's just a tedious romance filled with laughably bad dialogue....
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Darkest Hour (2017)
Directed by Joe Wright, starring Gary Oldman, Stephen Dillane, Lily James. Critics Consensus: Darkest Hour is held together by Gary Oldman's electrifying performance, which brings Winston Churchill to life even...
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Dunkirk (2017)
Directed by Christopher Nolan, starring Fionn Whitehead, Tom Hardy, Mark Rylance. Critics Consensus: Dunkirk serves up emotionally satisfying spectacle, delivered by a writer-director in full command of his craft and...
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The English Patient (1996)
Directed by Anthony Minghella, starring Ralph Fiennes, Juliette Binoche, Willem Dafoe. Critics Consensus: Though it suffers from excessive length and ambition, director Minghella's adaptation of the Michael Ondaatje novel is...
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Das Boot (1981)
Directed by Wolfgang Petersen, starring Jürgen Prochnow, Herbert Grönemeyer, Klaus Wennemann. Overview: A German submarine hunts allied ships during the Second World War, but it soon becomes the hunted. The crew tries to...
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Valkyrie (2008)
Directed by Bryan Singer, starring Tom Cruise, Kenneth Branagh, Bill Nighy. Critics Consensus: Given the subject matter, Valkyrie could have been an outstanding historical thriller, but settles for being a mildly...
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Greyhound (2020)
Directed by Aaron Schneider, starring Tom Hanks, Stephen Graham, Rob Morgan. Critics Consensus: Greyhound's characters aren't as robust as its action sequences, but this fast-paced World War II thriller benefits from...
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The Imitation Game (2014)
Directed by Morten Tyldum, starring Benedict Cumberbatch, Keira Knightley, Matthew Goode. Critics Consensus: With an outstanding starring performance from Benedict Cumberbatch illuminating its fact-based story, The Imitation Game...
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Schindler's List (1993)
Directed by Steven Spielberg, starring Liam Neeson, Ben Kingsley, Ralph Fiennes. Critics Consensus: Schindler's List blends the abject horror of the Holocaust with Steven Spielberg's signature tender humanism to create...
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The Eagle Has Landed (1976)
Directed by John Sturges, starring Michael Caine, Donald Sutherland, Robert Duvall. Critics Consensus: Critics generally view The Eagle Has Landed as an old-fashioned, entertaining World War II adventure that, while...
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Atonement (2007)
Directed by Joe Wright, starring James McAvoy, Keira Knightley, Saoirse Ronan. Overview: As a 13-year-old, fledgling writer Briony Tallis irrevocably changes the course of several lives when she accuses her...
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Their Finest (2017)
Directed by Lone Scherfig, starring Gemma Arterton, Sam Claflin, Bill Nighy. Critics Consensus: Carried along by a winning performance from Gemma Arterton, Their Finest smoothly combines comedy and wartime drama to...
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Battle of Britain (1969)
Directed by Guy Hamilton, starring Harry Andrews, Michael Caine, Trevor Howard. Overview: In 1940, the Royal Air Force fights a desperate battle against the might of the Luftwaffe for control of the skies over...
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Eye of the Needle (1981)
Directed by Richard Marquand, starring Donald Sutherland, Kate Nelligan, Ian Bannen. Critics Consensus: Eye of the Needle is generally regarded as a gripping and well-acted World War II spy thriller, reminiscent of...
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Mrs. Miniver (1942)
Directed by William Wyler, starring Greer Garson, Walter Pidgeon, Teresa Wright. Critics Consensus: An excessively sentimental piece of propaganda, Mrs. Miniver nonetheless succeeds, due largely to Greer Garson's...