"Best 10 War Movies" Topic

Very interesting

Full video here: YouTube link

Enjoy That My Friends

'Come And See' would have to be up near the top of my list… but it's not nearly as fun as most of those.
There really aren't any foreign films on that list either.

I thought "Thin Red Line" was awful my self. My top one is always "Zulu".

Terrible list. With some good ones.

Enemy at the Gates, fun movie but I would never put it in a top ten list of war movies for instance. Thin Red Line was just dreck too. Longest Day was missing, as was Gettysburg, and Das Boot, and the original "All Quiet on the Western Front" surely goes before "We Were Soldiers" (good film up to the end though). And finally a list without Paths of Glory needs some revision. (OK, so I basically would rewrite practically the entire list).

Thin Red Line is AMAZING*.

*Note: "Amazing" is here defined as visually beautiful but meandering and underwhelming.

Thin Red Line = the only movie where I've ever fallen asleep during the show.

Thin Red Line was a great 20 min. war movie. The scene where they assault the Japanese bunkers, wonderful.

Japanese officer inside a bunker getting his troops ready to charge out, the GIs in terror facing Jap machine guns, I called in land of the Silver Stars.

Rest of the movie, very dull.

Open to discuss the others, but I agree that "Saving Private Ryan" is one of the best war movies ever made.

Might include Full Metal Jacket and Apocalypse Now in my top 10. I'm still old school/old movie and these are best to me not necessarily best cinematically, accurate etc. In no particular order: All's Quiet on the Western Front, Battleground, Bataan, Cruel Sea, Corvette K-225,Sands of Iwo Jima, Sahara, Attack, Air Force, They Were Expendable. Although about returning servicemen, not really a war film, The Best Years of Our Lives.

The Best Years of Our Lives is a great movie. Really shocked the Hollywood elites how well it did. Struck a cord with the American people who were adjusting to their sons, brothers, fathers, sweethearts, husbands returning from war.

Your others are all classics also. If a bit dated.

Cant forget the German "Stalingrad", Tae Guk Gi, Cross of Iron and A Bridge Too Far. All among my favorites. Have to join the chorus with the thoughts on TRL, truly awful

I like Talvisota (Winter War – a Finnish production)

I'm usually the odd man out on these. Thin Red Line one of my all time favorite movies, period. I thought Saving Private Ryan was awful.

I love "Battle of the Bulge" with Fonda, Mitchum and Bronson.

How about Breaker Morant?

Das Boot was amazing, Gettysburg was just okay. Enemy at the Gates was fun but silly.

Sahara, yes.

Enemy Below.

Does The Caine Mutiny count?

Aliens (best Vietnam movie ever).

Gallipoli

Grand Illusion

The Third Man (Cold War)

Paths of Glory.

Dr. Straneglove

Lawrence of Arabia

Close but not top 10: Waterloo, War and Peace, Twelve O'Clock High, Master & Commander, Apocalypse Now, Patton.

If you want a war movie that's everything short of actual footage of men in combat, look at Theirs is the Glory.

Vets directed by a vet. The real 'Bridge too Far' featuring the original locations and the original Paras.

Take care though, its hard to watch without getting emotional…

Orf you go then – Good Luck!

YouTube link

link

imdb.com/title/tt0171824

Thanks for that link Sparker.

We have been over this ground before.

TMP link

TMP link

Cross of iron by Sam Peckinpah

Just goes to show, get 10 people to make a list and get 10 different lists.

Hmm, looks like a very limited selection, all-American Hollywood. I certainly wouldn't have SPR at #1, the 1st 30 minutes of that film was awesome, but the rest was just standard fare.
IMHO & in no order (and there are so many gems to choose from & I'm sure that I'm forgetting a few)
A Walk in the Sun
Paths of Glory
Come and See
Das Boot
Breaker Morant
The Life & Death of Colonel Blimp
Zulu
Soldier of Orange
Kanal
The Cruel Sea

Hard to pick 10…

Tumbledown
The Duellists
A Bridge Too Far
Cold Mountain
Band of Brothers (series)
Lawrence of Arabia
The Winter War
Full Metal Jacket
The Pacific (series)
Black Hawk Down

Granted, 2 of those (Duellists and Cold Mountain) have wars as the background to the story, but both in their way show a more panoramic view of conflict (Cold Mountain especially, showing what life was like in those small towns deprived of fighting age men).

Chalant

"Your others are all classics also. If a bit dated."
You're right Oddball, they are dated, just like I am.

Don't forget ' Charge of the Light Brigade ' , ' Hamburger Hill ' , and ' Tigerland ' ( my favourite Vietnam war film ).

There are just too many good ones for a measly top ten! It perhaps would be more fair to do it by genre.

One thing that is funny is how many of the films on the original list above I really, really hated.

Private Ryan was great until they got off of Omaha, then it became just another Spielberg fairy tale. If he REALLY wanted to make a point, he should have blown Tom Hanksī head off in a most grisly fashion, rather than having him die that Hollywood death, kind of like Bette Davis in Dark Victory.

One film I think that definitely needs to be on the list is The Big Parade, from 1924. It is an outstanding film on WWI, and the one I plan to watch in August to commemorate the start of the war.

I always thought "Glory" with Denzel Washington and Matthew Broderick was a terrific war movie.

"The Blue Max" and "Battle of Britain" are also on my Top 10 list.

84 Charlie Mopic

@OP; Too bad you never looked at movies made before 1980, you missed some good ones.

Fort Saganne
Winter War
In Which We Serve
Das Boot
Thin Red Line
Battleground
All Quiet on the Western Front
Four Feathers (1930s)
Damn the Defiant
Paths of Glory

Finally, The Third Man is perhaps the most perfect movie ever made but it's not a war movie.

Cheers,

Bob Coggins

Tunes of Glory – a great movie. I'd second Thin Red Line being beautiful but sleep inducing. "Ice Cold In Alex" ?