10 Underrated War Films for Serious Movie Buffs
There's no doubt that there's a lot of great war cinema out there for movie buffs. You've got Full Metal Jacket, The Deer Hunter, and Saving Private Ryan just to name a well-known handful. But for every iconic film that has received dozens of accolades, there's a great movie that never made it to the spotlight-especially ones that didn't focus on the Western side of warfare.
1. Rescue Dawn
A U.S. fighter pilot (Christian Bale), is shot down over Laos during the Vietnam War and interned at a POW camp, where he must struggle to survive through starvation, illness, and torture.
2. City of Life and Death
The atrocities committed by the Japanese during the 1937 occupation of Nanking are seen through the eyes of a conflicted Japanese soldier (Hideo Nakaizumi) and a Chinese officer (Ye Liu).
3. The Killing Fields
A reporter (Sam Waterston) and his interpreter (Haing S. Ngor) become friends during Pol Pot's bloody "Year Zero" cleansing campaign.
4. Letters From Iwo Jima
The 1945 Battle of Iwo Jima between the United States and Imperial Japan during World War II is told from the perspective of the Japanese soldiers in Clint Eastwood's Oscar-nominated epic.
5. The Thin Red Line
A U.S. Army absconder (Jim Caviezel) living peacefully on a South Pacific island is forced to resume active duty as U.S. troops mount an assault on the Japanese in 1942.
6. Tae Guk Gi
A soldier in the Korean War (Dong-Kun Jang) offers to take on the riskiest assignments in order to protect his little brother (Won Bin) from heavy battle.
7. Waltz With Bashir
An autobiographical animated film about an Israeli soldier in the 1982 war with Lebanon who, having blocked out his own memories of the conflict, seeks out others to remember what happened.
8. The Missing Picture
The atrocities of Cambodia's Khmer Rouge are retold through clay figures and archival footage.
9. Downfall
You might recognize this one from the numerous parodies found on the Internet, but this drama follows Adolf Hitler's final days as he waited out the end of World War II in a Berlin bunker.
10. Three Kings
One could call David O. Russell's dark comedy an underrated post-war movie, with its three characters (played by George Clooney, Mark Wahlberg, and Ice Cube) attempting to pull off a gold heist in the waning days of the Persian Gulf War.
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