World War 2 films on UK TV this weekend (26/5/18-27/5/2018)

There's really not a great deal of war films on UK tv this weekend, but I did this post last week and it was fairly well received, so I thought I'd do it again anyway... So here's the 2 offerings, which seems a bit paltry for us war movie fans, don't you think?

Guns of Navarone
Spike, Saturday 25th May, 15:45.

Another British classic, the story revolves around a group of Allied commandos tasked with the important mission of taking out 2 land based guns that thwart Allied naval efforts in the Eastern Mediterranean.

Year of production: 1961, age rating: PG, running time: 2h 50m. Starring: Gregory Peck, David Niven, Anthony Quinn and Stanley Baker. Director: J. Lee Thompson.

Movies poster for The Dirty Dozen

The Dirty Dozen

Spike Sunday 26th May, 18:00. 

Set in WW2, Allied command dreams up a suicidal mission for a small group to infiltrate Nazi-occupied Brittany and raid a meeting of senior German officers giving the Allies the upper hand for D-Day. This task falls to a dozen of the worst convicts in the US Army, who are offered pardons if the  mission is a success. 

Year of production: 1967, age rating: 15, running time 1h 30m. Starring: Lee Marvin, Ernest Borgnine, Charles Bronson and Jim Brown. Director: Robert Aldrich. 

Four brilliant World War 2 films on UK TV this weekend (19/5/18-20/5/2018)

I thought I'd take a break from writing about war films that are currently streaming and have a look at some of the movies available on tv to watch this weekend. I must say I was pleasantly surprised, there's some really good movies to watch from friday night right through to sunday. Without any further adieu here's the list:

Saving Private Ryan:
Sky One, Saturday 19th May, 21:00. 

This is probably on of the greatest World War 2 films ever made and the opening scene is the definitive D-Day cinema scene, if you haven't seen it, it's fantastic, visceral and so immersive you really should watch it. You can easily find this Steven Spielberg classic in lots of greatest war movies lists and for very good reason, it's awesome.

If you don't know much about the film here's a quick run down. Set in World War 2 the films begins at Omaha Beach with the D-Day landings. The film then follows the exploits of a small group of G.I.s on a mission to bring Private Ryan back as his 3 other brothers had been killed in action.

Year of production: 1998, age rating: 15, running time: 2h 50m. Starring: Tom Hanks, Edward Burns,
Matt Damon and Tom Sizemore. Director: Steven Spielberg.

The Dam Busters:
Film 4, Sunday 20th May, 16:20. 

A British war film classic, poignant as this week marks 75 years since the actual attack on German dams in World War 2. The film tells the story of no.617 squadron of the RAF, who were tasked with delivering experimental bouncing bombs developed by Barnes Wallis. With the aim to destroy vital dams in Germany's industrial regions, flooding valleys and massively disrupting Nazi Germany's war time production.

Year of production: 1955, age rating: U, running time: 2h 50m. Starring: Richard Todd, Michael Redgrave, Ursula Jeans and Basil Sydney. Director: Michael Anderson.

A Bridge Too Far:
Spike, Saturday 19th May, 15:50. 

In my opinion the best World War Two movie ever made. Based around the real Operation Market
Garden, which was an ambitious Allied plan to scythe through the German front lines capture channel ports and greatly reduce the length of the war.

Year of production: 1977, age rating 15, running time: 2h 34m. Starring: Dirk Bogarde, James Caan, Michael Caine and Sean Connery. Director: Richard Attenborough


Guns of Navarone
Spike, Sunday 20th May, 17:50.

Another British classic, the story revolves around a group of Allied commandos tasked with the important mission of taking out 2 land based guns that thwart Allied naval efforts in the Eastern Mediterranean.

Year of production: 1961, age rating: PG, running time: 2h 50m. Starring: Gregory Peck, David Niven, Anthony Quinn and Stanley Baker. Director: J. Lee Thompson.

For other war films ideas please check out some of my other posts: 
Every war film currently on Netflix UK in 1 list.
List of the best WW2 films available on Netflix.
Best current war movies on Amazon video.

List of the best World War 2 movies to stream on Netflix right now (May 2018)

Brad Pitt stars in Fury following a
WW2 Sherman crew

World War Two what a great topic for a war movie, I was really excited to go through the Netflix catalogue and see what great WW2 films there were only, there's not that many sadly. I had thought about doing a top 10 or a top 20 or something of the sort but alas, I only seem to find 7 and actually most of them I haven't (yet) watched. No use complaining I guess, what can Netflix UK offer? well of the 7 there certainly is some variety, they aren't all Hollywood blockbusters, there's a Russian production and an Indian one. The earliest two date from war time and the latest are barely a couple of years since release. There's some big name actors and some you've probably never heard of. It's a fairly good if short selection of war genre cinema to enjoy. I'm going to rank the films into some sort of order, like I said I haven't seen them all, where I have I'll add in some of my own comments and opinions, other than that find out below the film title, the main actors in the production, the director it's screen time and age rating. 



Hacksaw Ridge

One of the most influential war movies of recent times. Nominated for various awards. The premise is perhaps a little unusual a war film, the lead part being about a pacifist war hero. Nevertheless bravery and courage are familiar themes and despite the morals of the story this is a bona fide action filled war film. I've included the YouTube trailer below, for a good glimpse at this epic movie. 

Year of production: 2016, age rating: 15, running time: 2h 19m. Starring: Andrew Garfield, Sam Worthington, Luke Bracey and Teresa Palmer. Director: Mel Gibson.



Fury

I must admit I approached this film with a little scepticism, I'm not Brad Pitt's biggest fan anyway and I was never taken by Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds. However I was very pleasantly surprised the movie is more on the sort of action scale of things and less gritty, but this is far from a cheesy action movie and is a very good war film. It follows the crew of a Sherman M4A2 (76) nicknamed Fury, during warfare in Germany in 1945. 

Year of production: 2014, age rating: 15, running time: 2h 14m. Starring: David Ayer, Brad Pitt, Logan Lerman and Shia LaBeouf. Director: David Ayer.

Stalingrad
2013, 15, 2h 10m. During the epic World War 2 battle for Stalingrad a group of Red Army soldiers holes up in a house. Starring: Pyotr Fyodorov, Dmitriy Lysenkov, Alexey Barabash and Andrey Smolyakov. Director: Fedor Bondarchuk.
(not to be confused with the 1993 film of the same name.)

The Fighting Seabees
1944, U, 1h 39m. Wartime movie about US construction battalions, known as Seabees. Despite their civilian status the workers soon find themselves armed and facing the Japanese enemy. Starring: John Wayne, Susan Hayward, Dennis O'Keefe as Lt. Cmdr. Robert Yarrow and William Frawley. Director: Edward Ludwig.

Pimpernel Smith
1941, U, 2h 1m. Posing as an Archaeologist, the protagonist secretly gets people out of wartime Nazi Germany. Starring: Leslie Howard, Francis L. Sullivan and Mary Morris. Director Leslie Howard.

Rangoon
2017, Guidance, 2h 32m. Female daredevil entertainer, goes from entertaining troops to involved in the action in this Indian production. Starring: Saif Ali Khan, Shahid Kapoor and Kangana Ranaut. Director: Vishal Bhardwaj.

USS Indianapolis: Men of Courage

I watched this recently because it's a war film that I hadn't seen, I can't say much else about attracted me to it. I think was for a good reason, there's some fairly good action scenes, the CGI is good but not a scratch on other Hollywood efforts and more recent video games. This sort of theme carries through all of it, the acting is in no way bad nor is it good and it's hard to have a real empathy for the characters and their plight. On the plus side, naval war films are something of a rarity and this is certainly a good attempt at addressing that balance. It's probably worth a watch, but I'd struggle to recommend it wholeheartedly. 

Year of production: 2016, age rating: 15, running time: 2h 10m. Starring: Nicolas Cage, Tom Sizemore, Thomas Jane and James Remar. Director: Mario Van Peebles.

Netflix; all the current war films to stream in the UK on 1 list

Below is a list of all of the war movies currently available to stream on Netflix in the UK. I've added a short description on each entry just to clarify what the film is i.e. year and running time. I've written some reviews and ranked some of the films available already on previous posts, check those out if you wish. But for here it's just some basic information and a list of war films on Netflix in alphabetical order, enjoy.

6 Days 
2017, 15, 1h 34 m. Story about the Iranian Embassy siege of 1980 and the SAS raid to free the hostages. Starring: Jamie Bell, Abbie Cornish and Mark Strong. Director: Toa Fraser.

13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi
2016, 15, 2h 25m. Elite private military contractors in Libya, try to save the besieged US Consulate.

13 Hours the story of mercenaries defending US interests in Libya

Starring: John Krasinski, James Badge Dale and Max Martini. Director: Michael Bay

Act of Valour
2012, 15,1h 49m. Navy SEALs are tasked with rescuing an imprisoned CIA agent in the Philippines. Starring: Roselyn Sánchez, Nestor Serrano, Emilio Rivera and Rorke Denver. Directors: Mike McCoy and Scott Waugh.

Beasts of No Nation
2015, 15, 2h 17m. The brutal stories of civil war in Africa and child soldiers. Starring: Idris Elba, Abraham Attah, Kurt Egyiawan and Jude Akuwudike. Director: Cary Joji Fukunaga.

Behind Enemy Lines
1997, Mature, 1h 26m. 2 US Marines are tasked with acquiring nuclear devices from a Vietnamese general. Ending up with one of them in prison and the other coming to rescue him. Starring: Thomas Ian Griffith, Chris Mulkey, Mark Carlton and Mushond Lee. Director: Mark Griffiths.
(not to be confused with the 2001 film starring Owen Wilson and Gene Hackman).

Black Hawk Down 
2001, 15, 2h 24m. Following a US Special Forces led raid on a rebel leader in Mogadishu Somalia,

Black Hawk Down

things go awry. Starring: Josh Hartnett, Ewan McGregor, Tom Sizemore and Eric Bana. Director: Ridley Scott.

Casualties of War
1989, 18, 1h 53m. Covering some of the horrific treatment of civilians in war time, this Vietnam war film covers the brutal rape of a Vietnamese civilian and the subsequent investigation. Starring: Michael J. Fox, Sean Penn, Don Patrick Harvey and John C. Reilly. Director: Brian De Palma.

Check Point
2017, 15, 1h 37m. A former down on his luck US Marine, learns of plans for an enemy invasion of the US. Starring:  Kenny Johnson, William Forsythe, Bill Goldberg and Michelle Lee. Director: Thomas J Churchill.

The Delta Force
1986, 15, 2h 9m. US Special Forces are sent to resolve a hostage situation on board an American passenger flight. Starring: Chuck Norris, Lee Marvin, Martin Balsam and Joey Bishop. Director: Menahem Golan.

The Expendables 1
2010, 18, 2h 10m. A group of mercenaries are deployed to a South American island to overthrow the dictator. Starring: Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Jet Li and Dolph Lundgren. Director: Sylvester Stallone.

The Expendables 2
2012, 15, 1h 43m. Following a plane crash in Albania the mercenaries must retrieve a computer that contains information on the location of tonnes of Plutonium. Starring: Sylvester Stallone, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger. Director: Simon West.

The Expendables 3
2014, 12, 2h 6m. The elite team wage war with an arms dealer. Starring: Jason Statham, Antonio Banderas, Jet Li, Wesley Snipes. Director: Patrick Hughes.

The Fighting Seabees
1944, U, 1h 39m. Wartime movie about US construction battalions, known as Seabees. Despite their civilian status the workers soon find themselves armed and facing the Japanese enemy. Starring: John Wayne, Susan Hayward, Dennis O'Keefe as Lt. Cmdr. Robert Yarrow and William Frawley. Director: Edward Ludwig.

Flyboys

Fury a modern take on WW2

2006, 12, 2h 18m. Young Americans volunteer to fight for France in World War One becoming the first US fighter pilots. Starring: James Franco, Martin Henderson, Jean Reno and Jennifer Decker. Director: Tony Bill.

Forbidden Ground
2013, 15, 1h 34m. Australian film about three British soldiers who 'go over the top' during the Great War only to be left stranded and alone in no man's land. Starring: Johan Earl, Tim Pocock and Martin Copping. Director:  Johan Earl and Adrian Powers.

Fury
2014, 15, 2h 14m. Follows the exploits of an American tank crew and their M4 Sherman named Fury
in the last year of World War Two. Starring:  David Ayer, Brad Pitt, Logan Lerman and Shia LaBeouf. Director: David Ayer.

Green Zone
2010, 15, 1h 54m. A team of American inspectors is sent to Iraq to find stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction, instead they find a massive conspiracy. Starring: Matt Damon, Amy Ryan, Brendan Gleeson and Greg Kinnear. Director: Paul Greengrass.

Hacksaw Ridge

Hacksaw Ridge
2016, 15, 2h 19m. US medic and pacifist is the unlikely hero, patching up his comrades to win the Medal of Honor in the battle of Okinawa. Starring: Andrew Garfield, Sam Worthington, Luke Bracey and Teresa Palmer. Director: Mel Gibson.

He Who Dares: Downing Street Siege
2014, 15, 1h 26m. Operative kicked out of the Special Air Service, is the only one to turn to when Downing Street is under attack. Starring: Tom Benedict Knight, Simon Phillips and Russell Kilmister. Director: Paul Tanter,

Invasion USA
1985, 18, 1h 47m. Retired CIA operative is America's only hope when his former Soviet nemesis wages a war of terror on the USA. Starring: Chuck Norris, Richard Lynch, Melissa Prophet and Alex Colon. Director: Joseph Zito.

The Kingdom
2007, 15, 1h 50m. A team of US FBI agents are sent to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia to investigate the bombing of an American facility. Starring: Jamie Foxx, Chris Cooper, Jennifer Garner and Jason Bateman. Director: Peter Berg.

Madras Cafe
2013, 15, 2h 8m. An Indian film, set during the Sri Lankan civil war a Indian Army officer is tasked with disrupting the rebels. Starring: John Abraham, Nargis Fakhri, Rashi Khanna and Siddharth Basu. Director: Shoojit Sircar.

Chuck Norris is MIA in 'Nam

Missing in Action 2: The Beginning
1985, 18, 1h 35m. Captured in Vietnam and tortured, US POWs are forced to grow opium, until they are pushed too far and escape. Starring: Chuck Norris, Soon-Tek Oh, Steven Williams and Bennett Ohta. Director: Lance Hool.

Operation Mekong
2016, 15, 2h 3m. Chinese film based around real events, Chinese vessels are intercepted by drug cartels. Starring: Eddie Peng, Zhang Hanyu, Wenjuan Feng and Carl Ng. Director: Dante Lam.

Pimpernel Smith
1941, U, 2h 1m. Posing as an Archaeologist, the protagonist secretly gets people out of wartime Nazi Germany. Starring: Leslie Howard, Francis L. Sullivan and Mary Morris. Director Leslie Howard.

Rangoon
2017, Guidance, 2h 32m. Female daredevil entertainer, goes from entertaining troops to involved in the action in this Indian production. Starring: Saif Ali Khan, Shahid Kapoor and Kangana Ranaut. Director: Vishal Bhardwaj.

Sand Castle
2017, 15, 1h 53m. US army soldiers following the 2003 invasion of Iraq are tasked with ensuring a water supply to a remote village in the face of enemy action. Starring: Nicholas Hoult, Logan Marshall-Green, Henry Cavill and Glen Powell. Director: Fernando Coimbra.

The Siege of Firebase Gloria
1989, 18, 1h 39m. Australian made Vietnam war film, at the start of the Tet Offensive a US Marine patrol arrives at the remote base Gloria and become besieged. Starring: Wings Hauser, R. Lee Ermey, Robert Arevalo and Mark Neely. Director: Brian Trenchard-Smith

The Siege of Jadotville
2016, 15, 1h 48m. A small Irish Army detachment on a UN mission in the Congo are besieged by

Irish soldiers fighting for their lives in Africa

thousands of Katangese troops. Starring: Jamie Dornan, Mark Strong, Mikael Persbrandt and Jason O'Mara. Director: Richie Smyth.

Soldiers of Fortune
2012, 15, 1h 33m. A retired special forces operative leads a group of tourist billionaires to fight a war. Starring: Christian Slater, Dominic Monaghan, Sean Bean and James Cromwell. Director: Maksim Korostyshevsky

Stalingrad
2013, 15, 2h 10m. During the epic World War 2 battle for Stalingrad a group of Red Army soldiers holes up in a house. Starring: Pyotr Fyodorov, Dmitriy Lysenkov, Alexey Barabash and Andrey Smolyakov. Director: Fedor Bondarchuk.
(not to be confused with the 1993 film of the same name.)

Stratton
2017, 15, 1h 34m. A British Special Boat Service operative hunts down terrorist intent on using bio-chemical weapons. Starring: Dominic Cooper, Gemma Chan, Austin Stowell and Tyler Hoechlin. Director: Simon West.

Tears of the Sun
2003, 15, 2h. During a civil war in Nigeria a US Navy Seal Team is sent to rescue a US citizen Dr. Lena Hendricks, but end up rescuing hundreds of refugees too. Starring: Bruce Willis, Monica Bellucci, Cole Hauser and Eamonn Walker. Director: Antoine Fuqua.

Tomorrow When the War Began 
2010, 12, 1h 43m. Australian film, a group of teenagers go away to the woods only to return and see their native land invaded by a foreign army, they soon form their own resistance. Starring: Caitlin Stasey, Rachel Hurd-Wood, Lincoln Lewis and Deniz Akdeniz . Director: Stuart Beattie.

Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning
2012, 18, 1h 54m. Part of the Universal Soldier series of films. A story of revenge for a family brutally murdered. Starring: Jean-Claude Van Damme, Dolph Lundgren, Scott Adkins and Andrei Arlovski. Director: John Hyams.

The manhunt for the leader of Al Qaeda

USS Indianapolis: Men of Courage
2016, 15, 2h 10m. Following the ship of the same name in World War 2, the vessel becomes stranded in the Philippine sea and the crew fight to survive. Starring: Nicolas Cage, Tom Sizemore, Thomas Jane and James Remar. Director: Mario Van Peebles.

Wolf Warrior
2015, 15, 1h 30m. Chinese production, People's Liberation Army special forces and a special detachment called Wolf Warriors do battle with druglords. Starring: Wu Jing, Scott Adkins, Yu Nan and Kevin Lee. Director: Wu Jing.

Wolf Warrior 2
2017, 15, 2h 3m. Sequel to Wolf Warrior follows the story of the elite Chinese troops and their battle with a land developer intent on destroying homes and lives. Starring: Wu Jing, Celina Jade, Frank Grillo, Hans Zhang. Director: Wu Jing.

Zero Dark Thirty 
2012, 15, 2h 37m. A dramatic reenactment of the hunt for Osama Bin Laden and his capture and killing in Pakistan. Starring: Jessica Chastain, Jason Clarke, Joel Edgerton and Jennifer Ehle. Director: Kathryn Bigelow.