5 Best World War II Movies are:
 

Objective Burma
Battleground
Patton
The Great Escape
The Cruel Sea

Hmmm...I might include Tora ! Tora ! Tora!

Bridge On The River Kwai

Longest Day
To Hell and Back
Kelly's Heroes
Guns of Navarone
Dirty Dozen

The Great Escape
The Guns of Navarone
Patton
Operation pacific (long story, old favorite)
U-571

I would consider for inclusion Sink the Bismark.
...and another movie about a submarine spying mission to Tokyo that has been more-or-less remade once or twice since under other titles... I forget the orignal title. Das Boot is a German submarine movie that ranks up there, too, and unusual because it's a GERMAN movie! LOL

I think there were at least 20 WWII movies better than Patton. That was almost as much a modern Hollyweird hatchet job as it was a WWII movie. Ranks up there with Oliver Stone's repeated sh*ty attempts to re-write history. Just my opinion;YMMV.

Twelve O'Clock High
Band of Brothers (series)
Run Silent, Run Deep
Schindler's List
Empire of the Sun
Das Boot

And it's almost cliché to add it, but I will anyway because it's still a great flick...

Saving Private Ryan

They Were Expendable

Sink the Bismarck

The Enemy Below

From Hell to Eternity (not from Here to Eternity which is itself a formidable picture but not strictly a WW II picture)

The Thin Red Line (Malick)


Of course one regrets leaving out To Hell and Back, Guadalcanal Diary, Run Silent Run Deep, A Bridge too Far, Europa Europa and many others.

But not Das Boot which I find a cloying piece of maudlin revisionist German self-pity, much like the despicable movie Stalingrad, in which the perpetrators of the war seek to portray themselves as it's innocent victims, the German myth of "clean hands". Downfall is a much more honest German look at things and come to think of it probably belongs right up there with the best pictures about the war.

My 10 year old daughter and I just watched that. We both loved it.

John

My list would be:
A Bridge Too Far
In Harm's Way
Twelve O'Clock High
The Cruel Sea
Der Untergang (The Downfall)

I'm gonna name a few missed, and that I also think were great.. most all old WWII movies are great to me..

The Fighting Seabees
Sands of Iwo Jima
Midway
Saving Private Ryan
Catch-22

Wham---Yeah, In Harm's Way is terrific, one of Wayne's best non Ford or Hawks portrayals. And the romance between Wayne and Neal is SO well done, like real adults.

Ole Preminger made some pretty good pictures.

Another good Navy picture is The Gallant Hours in which Cagney portrays Halsey during the Guadalcanal campaign when the Japanese Navy was giving ours a very hard fight and we suffered the worst naval defeats in our history. The picture was directed by Robert Montgomery who fought in the Navy during the war.

Montgomery also did some fill-in directing on They Were Expendable after Ford took a header off a camera crane.

OH.. I really liked McHale's Navy too..

Bridges at Toko Ri, ,,The Hunters,,Patton,,The Caine Mutiny,,,Saving Private Ryan

"Mrs. Miniver" and "The Best Years of Our Lives" are worth mentioning.

I liked 'Enemy at the Gates.' 'Memphis Belle' is also a great one.

Kelly's Heroes is one of my all time favorite movies in general. (props to terra1:thmbsp:)

Not WWII, but war-ish type movies I really like are 'Lord of War' and 'Shooter.'

Sorry ,,the first two are Korean Conflict so switch to Stalag 17,,and the War Lover

"we'll have to work, get kicked around....."


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A Bridge Too Far
In Harm's Way
Das Boot
Battleground
Battle of Britain
Enemy at the Gates
Memphis Belle
Battle of the Bulge
El Alamein

.... pick any five, all superb!

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Battleground



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The Big Red One


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Stalingrad


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Das Boot


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A Bridge Too Far


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The Longest Day


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The Great Escape




HONORABLE MENTION: If for no other reason than to see a real PzK VI Tiger and a real M4 Sherman side by side.

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Kelly's Heros

How Bout
 

I think that Mister Roberts and Where Eagles Dare also need to be mentioned. (It's got Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood kicking Nazi butt)

Ya know pmsummer.. after seeing all your vinyl listening posts, and then seeing your post here for movies, I believe you are the one person who honestly reads Playboy for the pictures :D

Couple that weren't mentioned.

Murphy's War
Dirty Dozen

Couple more Sahara,,The Big Red One

5 Best
 

Five best I've seen without vacuuming out my brain are:

A Wing and a Prayer

Dawn Patrol

Apocalypse Now

The Deer Hunter

Young Lions

5 Best
 

nice artwork

The Caine Mutiny "Ahhh, the Strawberries." (BTW, WTF is flash cream? Only war movie I've seen this in)

Enemy Below "He is the Devil, Heimi!"

Bridge over the River Kwai "What have I done?"

Saving Private Ryan "Well, maybe not the captain, but the rest of us got mothers."

The Longest Day "Yeah, our blood, his guts"

1. The Train
2. Patton
3. Kelly's Heroes
4. The Dirty Dozen
5. The Longest Day

Flash cream was to prevent flash burns on exposed skin when the main batteries opened fire.
"Yeah..Our blood, his guts" was actually from 'Patton'

"The Guns of Navarone"...still my all-time fave.
"The Great Escape"...just might be a tie for first here.
"Von Ryan's Express"...funny no one's mentioned this one...Good Sinatra flick,
"The Dirty Dozen"...the prototype for all the other "gang" war flicks.
"Casablanca"..."Round up the usual suspects!"

Das Boot: great movie; the best, it induces claustrophobia
Memphis belle: watch this many times; it is the air Das Boot
Saving Private Ryan: disembarkment was so damn real
A Brridge Too Far
The Longest Day: poignant in black and white

Sink the Bismark: Very accurate, even had real footage of the actual battle.
The Train: nice call AnalogDigit!
To Hell and Back: Audie Murphy bio-pic
Attack!: Eddie Albert and Jack Palance are great in this!
Hell is for Heroes: Maybe Steve McQueen's best role

McQueen at his best. I saw this one many years ago and was impressed by McQueen.

Two excellent choices.

the young Lions,excellent,,,but Deer Hunter,and Apocalypse Now are Vietnam Era

Dawn Patrol... WWI.

There was a foreign made WWII film (maybe from Italy..?) starring Bo Svenson and Fred "The Hammer" Williamson about some condemned GI criminals who escaped and ended up attacking a German train. It was released under several names including "Deadly Mission", "GI Bro", and "Inglorious Bastards". Anyone ever seen it? It was on HBO in the early 80's and ends when the Americans blow up the train using the V-2 it was carrying. It wasn't a very good movie but it was kind of entertaining.

:thumbsdn::nono::nono:Ooopppss!!!!! Probably pays give the heading more than a quick glance.

Wwii
 

Midway
Midway
Midway
Midway
oh and MIDWAY.

Navy guy here of course.

30 Seconds Over Toyko,,,Battle Cry ,,Tarawa Beachead