Items24The creator’s order
  1. 1Come and See (1985)Come and See (1985) 8.3/10 on IMDbReleased 17 Oct 1985A Belarusian boy's excitement about joining partisans gives way to a devastating loss of security during the Nazi occupation. Aleksei Kravchenko's face carries the change more forcefully than any account of military progress. This older exception centres civilian terror, including atrocities, and…0
  2. 2Grave of the Fireflies (1988)Grave of the Fireflies (1988) 8.5/10 on IMDbReleased 16 Apr 1988A brother's attempts to care for his sister expose how food, shelter and social sympathy disappear in wartime Japan. Isao Takahata's animation keeps ordinary appetites and gestures painfully specific. The older exception is an adaptation of Akiyuki Nosaka's story, not a claim that these exact…0
  3. 3The Thin Red Line (1998)The Thin Red Line (1998) 7.6/10 on IMDbReleased 23 Dec 1998Terrence Malick lets soldiers' inward questions interrupt the apparent purpose of an assault on Guadalcanal. Faces, grass and frightened pauses keep complicating the military objective. The characters are fictional within a historical campaign; the reward is an unsettled attention to vulnerability…0
  4. 4No Man's Land (2001)No Man's Land (2001) 7.9/10 on IMDbReleased 12 May 2001Soldiers trapped between Bosnian lines become a problem that institutions would prefer to describe rather than solve. The arguments have an absurd comic edge without making their physical danger abstract. Danis Tanović's fictional situation is valuable for watching how national labels and public…0
  5. 5The Pianist (2002)The Pianist (2002) 8.5/10 on IMDbReleased 17 Sept 2002Władysław Szpilman's changing hiding places make a city's occupation legible through shrinking room to move. Adrien Brody's physical withdrawal keeps survival distinct from heroic mastery. Adapted from Szpilman's memoir, the film gives a particular Jewish survivor's experience rather than a…0
  6. 6Grbavica: The Land of My Dreams (2006)Grbavica: The Land of My Dreams (2006) 7.2/10 on IMDbReleased 1 Mar 2006A mother's everyday bargaining over money and a school trip is inseparable from what she has survived in Sarajevo. Mirjana Karanović makes withholding the past feel like tiring work. Jasmila Žbanić centres the aftermath of wartime sexual violence through an invented mother and daughter, where…0
  7. 7The Wind That Shakes the Barley (2006)The Wind That Shakes the Barley (2006) 7.5/10 on IMDbReleased 23 Jun 2006Two brothers' political commitments emerge from work, friendship and an increasingly divided community. Ken Loach makes the move from the Irish War of Independence into civil war hurt at the level of ordinary loyalties. The central brothers are fictional; the historical setting gives their…0
  8. 8Letters from Iwo Jima (2006)Letters from Iwo Jima (2006) 7.8/10 on IMDbReleased 9 Dec 2006Letters and private memories let Japanese soldiers exist beyond the role an enemy's battle story would allot them. Ken Watanabe's commander and Kazunari Ninomiya's conscript face the same looming defeat from unequal positions. A dramatisation drawing on historical material, it is strongest when…0
  9. 9Incendies (2010)Incendies (2010) 8.3/10 on IMDbReleased 17 Sept 2010A mother's instructions send her adult children towards a history their family has not been able to tell. Denis Villeneuve uses a fictional country shaped by regional conflicts rather than naming the story a literal record of one war. Sexual violence and devastating revelations make this an…0
  10. 10In This Corner of the World (2016)In This Corner of the World (2016) 7.8/10 on IMDbReleased 12 Nov 2016Suzu's drawing, cooking and household economies keep wartime Kure recognisable as a place people inhabit before it becomes a historical event. Sunao Katabuchi's animation gives changing ingredients and small accidents dramatic weight. The fictional family's ordinary adjustments make the cost of…0