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All Quiet on the Western Front (1929)
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| This is an English language film (made in America) adapted from a novel by German author Erich Maria Remarque. The film follows a group of German schoolboys, talked into enlisting at the beginning of World War 1 by their jingoistic teacher. The story is told entirely through the experiences of the young German recruits and highlights the tragedy of war through the eyes of individuals. As the boys witness death and mutilation all around them, any preconceptions about "the enemy" and the "rights and wrongs" of the conflict disappear, leaving them angry and bewildered. This is highlighted in the scene where Paul mortally wounds a French soldier and then weeps bitterly as he fights to save his life while trapped in a shell crater with the body. The film is not about heroism but about drudgery and futility and the gulf between the concept of war and the actuality.
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Apocalypse Now (1979)
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| Nominated for 8 Academy Awards, this classic and compelling Vietnam War epic stars Martin Sheen as Captain Willard, who is sent on a dangerous and mesmerizing odyssey into Cambodia to assassinate a renegade American Colonel named Kurtz (Marlon Brando), who has succumbed to the horrors of war and barricaded himself in a remote outpost.
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Boot, Das (1981)
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| "Das Boot" is a classic. This film couldn't be more intense and emotionally draining. It is a work of genius. Jurgen Prochnaw gives a spectacular performance as the German U-Boat Captain. The acting is first rate as the cast of characters is as realistic and believable as it gets. Don't watch this film unless you are absolutely prepared to immerse yourself into the drama of life as a crewman aboard a German submarine during war. This is a very rare portrayal of battle through the eyes of our enemy and will actually have you cheering for the "bad guys" at times. This is a one of a kind movie that must be seen to be believed.
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Bridge on the River Kwai, The (1957)
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| The film deals with the situation of British prisoners of war during World War II who are ordered to build a bridge to accommodate the Burma-Siam railway. Their instinct is to sabotage the bridge but, under the leadership of Colonel Nicholson (Alec Guinness), they are persuaded that the bridge should be constructed as a symbol of British morale, spirit and dignity in adverse circumstances. At first, the prisoners admire Nicholson when he bravely endures torture rather than compromise his principles for the benefit of the Japanese commandant Saito (Sessue Hayakawa). He is an honorable but arrogant man, who is slowly revealed to be a deluded obsessive. He convinces himself that the bridge is a monument to British character, but actually is a monument to himself, and his insistence on its construction becomes a subtle form of collaboration with the enemy. Unknown to him, the Allies have sent a mission into the jungle, led by Warden (Jack Hawkins) and an American, Shears (William Holden), to blow up the bridge.
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Casualties of War (1989)
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| During the Vietnam war, a girl is taken from her village by five American soldiers. Four of the soldiers rape her, but the fifth refuses. The young girl is killed. The fifth soldier is determined that justice will be done. The film is more about the realities of war, rather than this single event.
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Enemy at the Gates (2001)
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Based on a true World War II story, Enemy at the Gates stars Jude Law as Russian sniper Vassili Zaitsev, who is killing dozens of Nazi soldiers in the ruined city of Stalingrad. In response, the Germans dispatch their top shot, Major Konig
(Ed Harris), to exterminate Vassili. And that's when the action heats up, as director Jean-Jacques Annaud (Seven Years in Tibet) concocts a twisty duel to the death between two ace hunters.
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Full Metal Jacket (1987)
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"This is my rifle. There are many like it but this one is mine.", Full Metal Jacket (1987) is an Academy Award-nominated Stanley Kubrick film based on the novel The Short-Timers by Gustav Hasford. The title refers to the type of ammunition used by infantry riflemen. A two-segment story that follows young men from the start of recruit training in the Marine Corps to the lethal cauldron known as Vietnam.
The first segment follows Joker, Pyle and others as they progress through the hell of USMC boot-camp at the hands of the colorful, foul-mouthed Gunnery Sergeant Hartman. The second begins in Vietnam, near Hue, at the time of the Tet Offensive. Joker, along with Animal Mother, Rafterman and others, face threats such as ambush, booby traps, and Viet Cong snipers as they move through the city.
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Guns of Navarone, The (1961)
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| Gregory Peck, Anthony Quinn and David Niven are Allied saboteurs assigned an impossible mission: infiltrate an impregnable Nazi-held island and destroy the two enormous long-range field guns that prevent the rescue of 2,000 trapped British soldiers.
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Hart´s War (2002)
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| Fourth generation military Col. William McNamara (Bruce Willis) is imprisoned in a German POW camp. Still, as the camp's highest-ranking American officer, he commands his fellow inmates, keeping a sense of honor alive in a place where honor is easy to destroy, all under relinquishing his duty as a soldier, McNamara is silently planning, waiting for his moment to strike at the enemy.
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Killing Fields, The (1984)
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| A new york times reporter and his cambodian aide are harrowingly trapped in cambodias 1975 khmer rouge revolution.
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