Top five war movies
 

OK, things are too serious lately here on CG. Here is my attempt at a diversion. Name your top five war movies of all time. Here is my list (in order):

1) Saving Private Ryan

The gold standard.

2) Platoon

I was blown away by this movie when I first saw it. Great story, script, casting, etc. A very moving and thought-provoking film.

3) Thin Red Line

Some folks didn't like this, but I thought it was great. The part where they took the hill on Guadalcanal was classic.

4) Band of Brothers

Yeah, I know. It's not a movie, it's a series. But it was so well-done that I had to put it on the list. My only complaint was that it had some fairly boring filler material in places. Could have been shortened by a couple of hours. But exceptionally well-done overall.

5) The Deer Hunter

An oldie but goodie.

Didn't like sappy Spielberg fake story Private Ryan. Honest don't remember much from Platoon, so it couldn't have been that good (at least IMO). Thin Red Line, not enough meat there. Too symbolic.

Band of Brothers was excellent.

Deer Hunter bored me to death.

Too famous movies you didn't list were Apocalypse Now and Full Metal Jacket.

I liked Three Kings a lot.

Lawrence of Arabia is one of my all-time favorites.

Apocalypse Now

A Bridge Too far

The Longest Day

The Bridge on the River Kwai

Big Red One

The Green Berets

Patton

All Quiet on the Western Front

Midway

Glory

Band of Brothers was fabulous. Three Kings was terrific because it was so different from the typical war movie that was out there.

Can I also get a shout out for 'Pearl Harbor?' Truly, this could have been an amazing flick instead they spent 70% of the movie talking about some freakin' stupid and boring love triangle. Seriously, how dumb were they to do that? Like I said, the special effects were terrific, there was a great story to tell but Bruckheimer and crew thought that the crowd wanted a love triangle story? Holy crap, talk about a miscalculation of epic proportions. Oh well.

Here are three that ought to be on somebody's list:

Casablanca
The Great Escape
Kelly's Heroes

All Quiet On The Western Front
Gallipoli
Patton
Tora! Tora! Tora!
The Enemy Below
The Caine Mutiny
A Bridge Too Far
Bride On The River Kwai
Stalag 17
The Great Escape
Red Badge of Courage
Glory
We Were Soldiers

Best war book:

"The THings They Carried" by Tim OBrien

Gasp...choke....wheeze.... Well, so much for promoting brotherly love on CG.

Fake? There actually was a case in WWII where four (three?) brothers were killed in different theaters of war at about the same time. It was in fact discovered by a worker in the war dept. and they immediately sent out an order to retrieve the remaining son. The difference was that they knew exactly where the guy was and a chaplain found him immediately and broke the news. I recall reading about the case in one of Stephen Ambrose's books (Ambrose was a consultant on SPR by the way).

The first 25 minutes of the movie (Omaha Beach) were very realistic and true to historical facts. That battle scene alone made the movie. The rest of the movie was just a bonus feature.

I can see how some may find the ending sappy. Not me. I am just a sentimental guy, I suppose.

Yes, produced by the same folks, and done in exactly the same style (same cinematography, production crew, etc.) as Saving Private Ryan.


Yes, indeed. Those would have been in my top ten.

That puzzles me. I thought it was just so-so. And you thought SPR was "fake"? Hmmmm.....

Stop cheating folks. You can only list FIVE movies. Must be ranked by number.

I'm not certain how to rank them but I like many of the movies named.

Saving Private Ryan is one of my top five movies period.

Apocalypse Now, though a great movie, is NOT a war movie. It's Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" in a war setting. I love this movie and wrote my senior paper about its relationship to Heart of Darkness. It should be disqualified as a war movie.

Tora Tora Tora is a classic WWII movie and should be considered in top five.

All Quiet on the Western Front is a must.

We Were Soldiers is now discredited Mel Gibson's best work and moving for me.


In a way Ben Hur was a war movie as was Gladiator, but both don't count.

Contemporary, "Black Hawk Down" was an eye-opener, a movie I enjoyed. So those are my five, even though I have many others. But I do not wish to cheat.

These are all great choices. I really enjoy Bridge over the River Kwai.

A Movie I hated was Born on the Fourth of July.

1. Casablanca
2. Band of Brothers
3. Apocolypse Now
4. Three Kings
5. (TIE) Saving Private Ryan
5. (TIE) Black Hawk Down (war movie? not sure, but I will include it here...and yes it is easy to say, but the book was better, but the movie held its own)

Platoon was a close one but I went with the others listed. And yes, Apocolypse Now is not in a true strict sense a war movie because of its Heart of Darkness ties, but I still list it as a war movie.

1. Saving Private Ryan
2. Bridge On The River Kwai
3. Band of Brothers
4. Blackhawk Down
5. Saints and Soldiers...just kidding.

My real #5 - The Great Escape

Anyone who didn't like Saving Private Ryan has no soul. That movie ought to be required viewing in every High School History class.

Sorry.

1. Patton
2. The Enemy Below
3. Tora! Tora! Tora!
4. Stalag 17
5. The Caine Mutiny

Is that better?

Casablanca is a great movie, but I never considered it a war movie. It's a love story, isn't it? Should we call "Gone with the Wind" a war movie?

I hated Born on the 4th of July as well.

Bridge on the River Kwai was great, but I didn't realize the whistling was from this movie and not The Parent Trap.

Obviously not many aviators out there. How can you talk about realistic WWII flicks and neglect to mention The Battle of Britain. Riveting aerial fight scenes filmed using actual planes of the era (in the mid 60s the Spansih air forcee was STILL using some Henkel 111s that were pruchased buy the film company, repainted and used. Some fo the Me-109s were not authentic, as that plane was and is very rare, but most fo the planes were the real deal). A very good film.

Patton is also at the top of the list. Geroge C. Scott in the role he was born to play. He LOOKED like George Patton.

APocalypse now.

TOra, Tora, Tora

and

Stalag 17.

I liked the beginning of Saving Private Ryan. But the completely fictional hokey rescue thing was exactly that. Hokey and fake and syrupy.

Dang. Our lists are awfully close. You didn't have a younger brother who was put up for adoption, did you?

I can't believe I forgot about Battle of Britain. The arial scenes in it are tremendous. Awesome film.

Scott was great as Patton, but he was shot a low angles in order to make him look tealler than he really is. Patton was a good 7 or 8 inches taller than Scott.

The correct answer would be the Star Wars movies, minus episode I.

Next question please?

I knew I was missing something. That was my first War Movie. I still remember the guy getting shot in the goggles.

We have done this sort of thing before on these types of posts. I think we are cultural dopplegangers, which may or may not be a good thing.

Patton was tlaler, but man I thought Scott nailed that role.

1. The Dirty Dozen - I just love this movie
2. The Great Escape
3. Goodbye Mr Chips - Not really a war movie, but great none the less.

After that I just don't know, dang I haven't seen many war movies

I agree that Scott nailed it. A neighbor of mine across the street who fought in Patton's 3rd Army said that when he first saw the movie, he could ahve sworn that Patton was on the screen himself.

As for doppelganger, why do I giggle like a school kid each time I say that word?

The Seven Samurai.

Sort of war-ish.

I have read that same type of comment from others with knowledge of Patton. Ole blood and guts indeed.

How about this for a war movie... Braveheart?

1. Apocalypse Now

2. Saving Private Ryan

3. Ran

4. Schindler's List

5. Deer Hunter

6. Gladiator (I loved the Romans fighting the barbarians in the opening scene)

I forgot Ran.

The image of the blind guy on the wall still haunts me.

Some of us are cheating.

King Lear was a great play and Kirusawa's interpretation thereof was fabulous, and yes it involves battles, but a war movie?

Braveheart was worthwhile, but Rob Roy of Liam Neeson also deserves mention in my book, not as epochy but in some respects a better movie.

hard to narrow down to five, but here goes:

Saving Private Ryan
Band of Brothers
Full Metal Jacket (R Lee Ermey freakin rocked in that flick)
The Patriot (yeah, kinda sappy at times - but I loved it. we need more Rev War movies)
Tora Tora Tora

other faves:
Sergeant York
Thee Kings
Manchurian Candidate (the original - not sure if that one counts though)
The Green Berets
We Were Soldiers
Black Hawk Down
Midway

Patriot? Horrible movie. I think in addition to Jews Mel Gibson really has a hatred worked up for the British. He portrayed them as heinous as the Nazis, comitting genoside. The writing was also klunky. I hated that movie.

Three Kings, on the other hand, is a worthy mention. Good movie.

1. Dr. Strangelove
2. Apocalypse Now
3. Fail Safe
4. The Great Escape
5. Stalag 17

My favorites shift a bit with my mood, but I always find those five excellent.

The Patriot is another one of those movies that could have been terrific but I hated the storyline. Mel Gibson was not really a patriot in that movie at all, he was fighting to save his son, not his country. If they would have taken that out of the storyline and have Gibson decide to fight because he loved his country, that would have been a much better story.

I totally forgot about Dr. Strangelove which was a genius movie, no question.

My favorites (not in order):

WWII
1) Saving Private Ryan. Yeah, it's a fake story, but it had all of the elements of the European theater experience.

2) Band of Brothers. I give this series the highest of grades because among many of the great stories it told, it offers the best representation of the horrors of the Battle of the Bulge. Ten episodes let you really get to know the characters, something difficult to do in a 2-3 hour movie.

3) The Thin Red Line. I've not seen a better movie about the Pacific Theater.

WWI
1) Gallipoli. Excellent depiction of the futility of trench warfare.


Vietnam
1) When we were Soldiers. I was surprised at how much I like this film. I thought it did a good job of portraying the commitment of the North Vietnamese soldiers to their cause. This movie helped me to understand what our Soldiers were up against in Nam more than any other film I've seen.

2) Platoon. Haven't seen it since the 80's. Thought it was excellent then.

3) Apocalypse Now. Loved the cinematography. Had great dialouge. Thought the story was strange.

Ancient Rome

1) Gladiator. Have to agree with SU here. The opening scene is one of my all time movie favorites. I don't know how on earth they managed to film the calvary charging through the forest. Excellent stuff.

We are forgetting the greatest, most memorable, most beloved war movie of all time:

The Sound of Music.

Every one of my top 5 has been mentioned several times over already in this thread, except #2:

Tae Guk Gi (aka The Brotherhood of War)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0386064/

Seriously this Korean film impacted me in a way that only Saving Private Ryan duplicated. (That's my clear #1, whether or not it's a fake story). It's a story of two brothers fighting in the Korean War. Wonderful cinematography, compelling human element, emotionally powerful. If you like war movies, give this one a try--you won't be disappointed.

If you watch it, or have watched it, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts. I think it's the best war movie that 99% of Americans have never seen.


A couple others that may not meet the definition of a typical 'war movie' but that were great movies about WWII:
Schindler's List
The Pianist

And some others that are good but didn't make my list:
Where Eagles Dare
Guns of Navarone
Force Ten from Navarone (all three by the Tom Clancy of yesteryear, Alistair MacLean. A fantastic author and quick reads)

And the best and original submarine movie--Das Boot.

Also, as for Ran, I'd say that it qualifies as a war movie based solely on the sheer scope of those battle scenes. Incredible, and no CGI there. Good story too, of course Shakespeare had something to do with that and Kurosawa put his stamp on it.

More info on TaeGukGi, Amazon reviews

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...v=glance&n=130

Seriously, do not miss this movie.

You've inspired me to see Tae Guk Gi.

These are all great films.

Guns of Navarone is a great film.

And I watched Das Boot with Haneka de Groot. That made the film even better.

I agree Ohio.

I watched Tae Guk Gi:Brotherhood of War last year and it was an excellent film.

I highly recommend it for everyone.