1966, Czechoslovakia, Jiří Menzel
Milos Hrma, a bumbling dispatcher’s apprentice at a village railway station in occupied Czechoslovakia, longs to liberate himself from his virginity. Oblivious to the war and the resistance that surrounds him, he …

1969, France, Jean Pierre Melville
Great news for all freedom cinema fans. This ultimate feature film of the French resistance has been restored and re-released. Adapted from Joseph Kessel’s wartime novel the film is an exciting …

2002, France, Poland, Germany and UK, Roman Polanski
An adaptation of concert pianist Wladyslaw Szpilman’s memoirs about his experiences in Nazi occupied Warsaw. Incredibly moving film. No heroics. Sometimes all you can really do is just …

2001, USA, Jean-Jacques Annaud
In the winter of 1942, the German and Russian Armies meet in the great Battle of Stalingrad, one of the most murderous and critical engagements of the Second World War. Enter into …

1969, Yugoslavia, Veljko Bulajic
Big budget nationalist film (with imported Hollywood actors) of Yugoslav partisans fighting against the Nazis, Italians and local Chetnik collaborators. A young man from Lhasa told me it was screened to the …

1942, USA, Michael Curtiz
The ultimate WWII romance movie. Inspiring in parts, especially the defiant singing of the French national anthem in Ricks café. Yvonne a pretty French coquette, drinking with the Germans, and flirting with …

2001, UK, Gillian Armstrong
The fictional story of a British agent in Nazi occupied France who works with the French resistance to rescue her lover, a missing RAF pilot. God, what crap. Especially when you know …

1958, UK, Lewis Gilbert
Inspirational story of the allied spy Violette Szabo in Nazi occupied France. Standard story of wartime heroism and martyrdom, yet strangely moving because you know it really happened. Violette was captured by …

1957, USA, Lewis Gilbert
Based on the true story of the assassination of Nazi leader Reinhard Heydrich by Czech agents parachuted into occupied Czechoslovakia by British Intelligence. Standard WWII action film but scenes of Nazi reprisals …

1957, USA, David Lean
A British colonel, taken prisoner by the Japanese, builds a bridge for them and in the end even gives up his life trying to save it, so obsessed by pride in his …