The Most Accurate War Movies of All Time
Even if you favor entertainment over education when it comes to cinema, you probably care at least a little about historical accuracy when watching historical dramas. A little creative license never hurt anyone, but attention to detail adds an authenticity that makes the viewing experience feel richer. That’s especially true of war movies, which attract two overlapping sets of people sometimes known for being persnickety: history buffs and cinephiles. If you belong to either camp, you’ll want to watch these five war movies known for their historical accuracy.
From Here to Eternity (1953)
Though most war movies are praised or criticized for how accurately they portray the battlefield, Fred Zinnemann’s Best Picture winner has been noted for capturing another aspect of military life: the U.S. armed forces’ “obsession” with sports, which reached its zenith during World War II.
From Here to Eternity is mainly about the months leading up to the attack on Pearl Harbor, but one of its most significant subplots involves a regimental boxing team, which were common during World War II. (Its most famous scene, however, has nothing to do with either — and you’ve almost certainly seen it even if you’ve never seen the actual movie.) Soldiers were encouraged to pursue athletics to raise morale, with baseball and football also proving popular — not least for the way they contrasted with the preferred sports of the Axis.
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Threads (1984)
The threat of nuclear war was more prevalent when Threads was made in the 1980s than it is today, but watching this uniquely unsettling television movie will have your pulse pounding all the same.
Hailed as “a film which comes closest to representing the full horror of nuclear war and its aftermath” in Toni A. Perrine’s Film and the Nuclear Age: Representing Cultural Anxiety, the documentary-style drama takes place in Sheffield, England, over the course of more than a decade and pulls no punches in its portrayal of nuclear winter and the utterly devastating effects it would have. There’s little hope to be found in Threads, but the film is said to have had a sobering effect on everyone from Ronald Reagan to British Labour Party leader Neil Kinnock.
Come and See (1985)
There’s a very good chance that, even if you agree with the consensus that Come and See is among the greatest movies ever made, you won’t want to watch it more than once. It’s simply that disturbing, but director Elem Klimov’s insistence that his movie had to be “realistic to the maximum” is evident in every scene. That’s particularly true of its depiction of war crimes carried out by Germany during its occupation of Belarus, which has been singled out as the most shocking — and, tragically, historically accurate — aspect of the film.
Saving Private Ryan (1998)
It took $12 million, four weeks, and 1,500 background actors to film Saving Private Ryan’s landmark opening sequence, which shows the D-Day landing on Omaha Beach in excruciating detail. The result was clearly worth it, as Steven Spielberg’s World War II epic is regarded as one of the greatest movies ever made, earning $482 million at the box office on the way to winning five of the 11 Oscars for which it was nominated (though not, in a stunning upset, Best Picture).
Spielberg interviewed several World War II veterans during pre-production, and that same community was among the most laudatory when the movie was released. There were reports of veterans weeping during and after Saving Private Ryan, with one remarking that “the only thing that was missing was the smell.”
The Thin Red Line (1998)
Despite how memorable it is, Saving Private Ryan wasn’t even the best World War II movie released in 1998. That would be Terrence Malick’s The Thin Red Line, which, despite ultimately being about so much more than war in general or World War II in particular, faithfully captures both the Battle of Guadalcanal and the actual experience of being a soldier.
Malick’s philosophical, even poetic approach to the “overlooked” conflict at the film’s center didn’t get in the way of attention to detail, with historian John McManus praising the film for getting everything from how soldiers move across the field of battle to the actual blades of grass on that field right, and ultimately grading its accuracy a nine out of 10.
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