American War Film Watchlist
by jgijselhart | created - 26 Jun 2022 | updated - 26 Jun 2022 | Public- Instant Watch Options
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1. Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo (1944)
Passed | 138 min | Drama, History, War
In the wake of Pearl Harbor, a young lieutenant leaves his expectant wife to volunteer for a secret bombing mission which will take the war to the Japanese homeland.
Director: Mervyn LeRoy | Stars: Spencer Tracy, Van Johnson, Robert Walker, Tim Murdock
Votes: 6,462
2. They Were Expendable (1945)
Approved | 135 min | Drama, War
A Navy commander fights to prove the battle-worthiness of the PT boat at the start of World War II.
Directors: John Ford, Robert Montgomery | Stars: Robert Montgomery, John Wayne, Donna Reed, Jack Holt
Votes: 9,262
3. Sergeant York (1941)
Passed | 134 min | Biography, Drama, History
A Tennessee farmer and marksman is drafted in World War I, and struggles with his pacifist inclinations before becoming one of the most celebrated war heroes.
Director: Howard Hawks | Stars: Gary Cooper, Walter Brennan, Joan Leslie, George Tobias
Votes: 19,793 | Gross: $16.40M
4. Twelve O'Clock High (1949)
Not Rated | 132 min | Drama, War
A tough-as-nails general (Gregory Peck as General Savage) takes over a B-17 bomber unit suffering from low morale and whips them into fighting shape.
Director: Henry King | Stars: Gregory Peck, Hugh Marlowe, Gary Merrill, Millard Mitchell
Votes: 15,807
5. Battleground (1949)
Approved | 118 min | Action, Drama, History
True tale about a squad of the 101st Airborne Division coping with being trapped by the Germans in the besieged city of Bastogne, Belgium during the Battle of the Bulge in December of 1944.
Director: William A. Wellman | Stars: Van Johnson, John Hodiak, Ricardo Montalban, George Murphy
Votes: 7,865 | Gross: $10.29M
6. Task Force (1949)
Approved | 116 min | Drama, War
As he is retiring, Jonathan L. Scott "Scotty" reminisces about his long Navy career and the development of the role of the aircraft carrier from the early 20s.
Director: Delmer Daves | Stars: Gary Cooper, Jane Wyatt, Wayne Morris, Walter Brennan
Votes: 1,188
7. The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
Approved | 170 min | Drama, Romance, War
Three World War II veterans, two of them traumatized or disabled, return home to the American midwest to discover that they and their families have been irreparably changed.
Director: William Wyler | Stars: Myrna Loy, Dana Andrews, Fredric March, Teresa Wright
Votes: 70,575 | Gross: $23.65M
8. Sahara (I) (1943)
Approved | 97 min | Action, Drama, War
After the fall of Tobruk in 1942, during the Allied retreat in the Libyan desert, an American tank picks-up a motley group of survivors but they face advancing Germans and a lack of water.
Director: Zoltan Korda | Stars: Humphrey Bogart, Bruce Bennett, J. Carrol Naish, Lloyd Bridges
Votes: 9,755
9. Guadalcanal Diary (1943)
Approved | 93 min | Drama, War
The story of a large U.S. Marines invasion task force bound for Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands in 1942.
Director: Lewis Seiler | Stars: Preston Foster, Lloyd Nolan, William Bendix, Richard Conte
Votes: 2,279
10. The Fighting Seabees (1944)
Approved | 100 min | Drama, Romance, War
During WW2, the U.S. Navy implements a new idea of forming construction battalions that also are fighting units, in case of Japanese attack.
Director: Edward Ludwig | Stars: John Wayne, Susan Hayward, Dennis O'Keefe, William Frawley
Votes: 3,914
11. Story of G.I. Joe (1945)
Approved | 108 min | Biography, Drama, War
At the close of WWII, Pulitzer Prize-winning war correspondent Ernie Pyle travels with the U.S. Army's Company C Division during their liberation of Italy.
Director: William A. Wellman | Stars: Burgess Meredith, Robert Mitchum, Freddie Steele, Wally Cassell
Votes: 3,729
12. Corvette K-225 (1943)
Approved | 98 min | Action, Drama, Romance
The story of a Canadian WWII naval vessel, with a dramatic subplot concerning her first captain.
Directors: Richard Rosson, Howard Hawks | Stars: Randolph Scott, James Brown, Ella Raines, Barry Fitzgerald
Votes: 577
13. A Walk in the Sun (1945)
Approved | 117 min | Drama, War
During WWII, a platoon of American soldiers trudge through the Italian countryside in search of a bridge they have been ordered to blow up, encountering danger and destruction along the way.
Director: Lewis Milestone | Stars: Dana Andrews, Richard Conte, George Tyne, John Ireland
Votes: 4,080
14. Foreign Correspondent (1940)
Passed | 120 min | Action, Romance, Thriller
On the eve of World War II, a young American reporter tries to expose enemy agents in London.
Director: Alfred Hitchcock | Stars: Joel McCrea, Laraine Day, Herbert Marshall, George Sanders
Votes: 23,728 | Gross: $3.48M
15. Wing and a Prayer (1944)
Passed | 97 min | Action, Drama, War
In WW2, an American aircraft carrier sails around the Pacific on a decoy mission until it joins the battle of Midway against the Japanese forces.
Director: Henry Hathaway | Stars: Don Ameche, Dana Andrews, William Eythe, Charles Bickford
Votes: 1,549
16. Halls of Montezuma (1951)
Approved | 113 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
A company of Marines races against the clock to find a Japanese rocket base.
Director: Lewis Milestone | Stars: Richard Widmark, Jack Palance, Reginald Gardiner, Robert Wagner
Votes: 2,955
17. Bataan (1943)
Approved | 114 min | Drama, History, War
In 1942, in the Bataan peninsula of the Philippines, a ragtag American unit commanded by Sergeant Bill Dane attempts to blow-up a bridge in order to slow the Japanese advance.
Director: Tay Garnett | Stars: Robert Taylor, George Murphy, Lloyd Nolan, Thomas Mitchell
Votes: 2,707
18. Back to Bataan (1945)
Approved | 95 min | Drama, War
In 1942, after the fall of the Philippines to the Japanese, U.S. Army Col. Joseph Madden stays behind to organize the local resistance against the Japanese invaders.
Director: Edward Dmytryk | Stars: John Wayne, Anthony Quinn, Beulah Bondi, Fely Franquelli
Votes: 4,373
19. Sands of Iwo Jima (1949)
Approved | 100 min | Action, Drama, Romance
Haunted by personal demons, Marine Sgt. John Stryker is hated and feared by his men, who see him as a cold-hearted sadist. But when their boots hit the beaches, they begin to understand the reason for Stryker's rigid form of discipline.
Director: Allan Dwan | Stars: John Wayne, John Agar, Adele Mara, Forrest Tucker
Votes: 11,414
20. Stalag 17 (1953)
Not Rated | 120 min | Comedy, Drama, War
After two Americans are killed while escaping from a German P.O.W. camp in World War II, the barracks black marketeer, J.J. Sefton, is suspected of being an informer.
Director: Billy Wilder | Stars: William Holden, Don Taylor, Otto Preminger, Robert Strauss
Votes: 58,826
21. The Bridges at Toko-Ri (1954)
Approved | 102 min | Drama, Romance, War
Set during the Korean War, a Navy fighter pilot must come to terms with with his own ambivalence towards the war and the fear of having to bomb a set of highly defended bridges. The ending of this grim war drama is all tension.
Director: Mark Robson | Stars: William Holden, Grace Kelly, Fredric March, Mickey Rooney
Votes: 6,335
22. Five Graves to Cairo (1943)
Passed | 96 min | Thriller, War
In the North African campaign a British straggler manages to pass himself off as a waiter at the hotel commandeered as Rommel's headquarters. He has thoughts of assassinating Rommel but his cover may have an even better use.
Director: Billy Wilder | Stars: Franchot Tone, Anne Baxter, Akim Tamiroff, Fortunio Bonanova
Votes: 6,835
23. To Hell and Back (1955)
Approved | 106 min | Action, Biography, Drama
The true WWII story of Audie Murphy, the most decorated soldier in U.S. history. Based on the autobiography of Audie Murphy who stars as himself in the film.
Director: Jesse Hibbs | Stars: Audie Murphy, Marshall Thompson, Charles Drake, Jack Kelly
Votes: 5,967
24. Wake Island (1942)
Passed | 88 min | Action, Drama, War
December, 1941. With no hope of relief or re-supply, a small band of United States Marines tries to keep the Japanese Navy from capturing their island base.
Director: John Farrow | Stars: Brian Donlevy, Robert Preston, Macdonald Carey, William Bendix
Votes: 2,199
25. Run Silent Run Deep (1958)
Approved | 93 min | Action, Drama, War
A U.S. sub commander, obsessed with sinking a certain Japanese ship, butts heads with his first officer and crew.
Director: Robert Wise | Stars: Clark Gable, Burt Lancaster, Jack Warden, Brad Dexter
Votes: 13,118
26. Pork Chop Hill (1959)
Approved | 97 min | Drama, War
During the Korean War peace talks, U.S. troops fight to retake a hill from the Communist Chinese forces.
Director: Lewis Milestone | Stars: Gregory Peck, Harry Guardino, Rip Torn, George Peppard
Votes: 5,278 | Gross: $4.02M
27. The Steel Helmet (1951)
Approved | 85 min | Action, Drama, War
A ragtag group of American stragglers battles against superior Communist troops in an abandoned Buddhist temple during the Korean War.
Director: Samuel Fuller | Stars: Gene Evans, Robert Hutton, Steve Brodie, James Edwards
Votes: 4,737
28. The Longest Day (1962)
G | 178 min | Action, Drama, History
The events of D-Day, told on a grand scale from both the Allied and German points of view.
Directors: Ken Annakin, Andrew Marton, Gerd Oswald, Bernhard Wicki, Darryl F. Zanuck | Stars: John Wayne, Robert Ryan, Richard Burton, Henry Fonda
Votes: 59,085 | Gross: $39.10M
29. The Dirty Dozen (1967)
Approved | 150 min | Action, Adventure, War
During World War II, a rebellious U.S. Army Major is assigned a dozen convicted murderers to train and lead them into a mass assassination mission of German officers.
Director: Robert Aldrich | Stars: Lee Marvin, Ernest Borgnine, Charles Bronson, John Cassavetes
Votes: 79,122 | Gross: $45.30M
30. Where Eagles Dare (1968)
M | 158 min | Action, Adventure, War
Allied agents stage a daring raid on a castle where the Nazis are holding American brigadier general George Carnaby prisoner, but that's not all that's really going on.
Director: Brian G. Hutton | Stars: Richard Burton, Clint Eastwood, Mary Ure, Patrick Wymark
Votes: 62,936
31. Castle Keep (1969)
R | 107 min | Action, Comedy, Drama
During the Battle of the Bulge, an anachronistic count shelters a ragtag squad of Americans in his remote 10th Century castle hoping a battle there against the advancing Germans will not lead to its destruction and all the heritage within.
Director: Sydney Pollack | Stars: Burt Lancaster, Patrick O'Neal, Jean-Pierre Aumont, Peter Falk
Votes: 3,484
32. M*A*S*H (1970)
R | 116 min | Comedy, Drama, War
The staff of a Korean War field hospital use humor and high jinks to keep their sanity in the face of the horror of war.
Director: Robert Altman | Stars: Donald Sutherland, Elliott Gould, Tom Skerritt, Sally Kellerman
Votes: 76,950 | Gross: $81.60M
33. Patton (1970)
GP | 172 min | Biography, Drama, War
The World War II phase of the career of controversial American general George S. Patton.
Director: Franklin J. Schaffner | Stars: George C. Scott, Karl Malden, Stephen Young, Michael Strong
Votes: 107,984 | Gross: $61.70M
34. Anzio (1968)
PG-13 | 117 min | Drama, History, War
Anzio: one of WWII's bloodiest battles as the Allies smash through the German lines which have enclosed the Anzio beachhead--four months and 30,000 casualties before the Allies finally march to Rome.
Directors: Edward Dmytryk, Duilio Coletti | Stars: Robert Mitchum, Peter Falk, Robert Ryan, Earl Holliman
Votes: 3,783
35. Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970)
G | 144 min | Action, Drama, History
The story of the 1941 Japanese air raid on Pearl Harbor, and the series of preceding American blunders that aggravated its effectiveness.
Directors: Richard Fleischer, Kinji Fukasaku, Toshio Masuda, Akira Kurosawa | Stars: Martin Balsam, Sô Yamamura, Jason Robards, Joseph Cotten
Votes: 37,233 | Gross: $29.55M
36. Midway (1976)
PG | 132 min | Action, Drama, History
A dramatization of the battle that was widely heralded as a turning point of the Pacific Theatre of World War II.
Director: Jack Smight | Stars: Charlton Heston, Henry Fonda, James Coburn, Glenn Ford
Votes: 21,494
37. Cross of Iron (1977)
R | 119 min | Drama, War
German commander Hauptmann Stransky places a squad in extreme danger after Sergeant Rolf Steiner refuses to lie for him.
Director: Sam Peckinpah | Stars: James Coburn, Maximilian Schell, James Mason, David Warner
Votes: 29,185
38. The Big Red One (1980)
R | 113 min | Drama, War
A hardened sergeant and the four core members of his infantry unit try to survive World War II as they move from battle to battle throughout Europe.
Director: Samuel Fuller | Stars: Lee Marvin, Mark Hamill, Robert Carradine, Bobby Di Cicco
Votes: 21,402
39. Heartbreak Ridge (1986)
R | 130 min | Drama, War
Hard-nosed, hard-living Marine Gunnery Sergeant Tom Highway clashes with his superiors and his ex-wife as he takes command of a spoiled recon platoon with a bad attitude.
Director: Clint Eastwood | Stars: Clint Eastwood, Marsha Mason, Everett McGill, Moses Gunn
Votes: 48,218 | Gross: $42.72M
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