The story of British officer T.E. Lawrence's mission to aid the Arab tribes in their revolt against the Ottoman Empire during the First World War. Lawrence becomes a flamboyant, messianic figure in the cause of Arab unity but his psychological instability threatens to undermine his achievements.
Ukraine, 16th century. While the Poles dominate the Cossack steppes, Andrei, son of Taras Bulba, a Cossack leader, must choose between his love for his family and his folk and his passion for a Polish woman.
The retelling of June 6, 1944, from the perspectives of the Germans, US, British, Canadians, and the Free French. Marshall Erwin Rommel, touring the defenses being established as part of the Reich's Atlantic Wall, notes to his officers that when the Allied invasion comes they must be stopped on the beach. "For the Allies as well as the Germans, it will be the longest day"
Essentially true story of how Spartan king Leonidas led an extremely small army of Greek Soldiers (300 of his personal body guards from Sparta) to hold off an invading Persian army now thought to have numbered 250,000.
World War II drama where the action centers around a single maneuver by a squad of GIs in retaliation against the force of the German Siegfried line. Reese joins a group of weary GIs unexpectedly ordered back into the line when on their way to a rest area. While most of the men withdraw from their positions facing a German pillbox at the far side of a mine-field, half a dozen men are left to protect a wide front. By various ruses, they manage to convince the Germans that a large force is still holding the position. Then Reese leads two of the men in an unauthorized and unsuccessful attack on the pillbox, in which the other two are killed; and when the main platoon returns, he is threatened with court-martial. Rather that face the disgrace, and in an attempt to show he was right, he makes a one-man attack on the pillbox.
In WW2, twelve year old Soviet orphan Ivan Bondarev works for the Soviet army as a scout behind the German lines and strikes a friendship with three sympathetic Soviet officers.
Brigadier General Frank D. Merrill leads the 3,000 American volunteers of his 5307th Composite Unit (Provisional), aka "Merrill's Marauders", behind Japanese lines across Burma to Myitkyina, pushing beyond their limits and fighting pitched battles at every strong-point.
In Argentina, one daughter of patriarch Madariaga is married to a Frenchman while the other is married to a German thus leading to a crisis when Nazi Germany occupies France and some Madariaga family members fight on opposite sides.
Tells the true story of American Gwen Terasaki, who falls in love with, then marries a Japanese diplomat. When World War II breaks out they encounter animosity and trouble from both sides.
American GI Ernie Williams, admittedly weak-kneed, has an uncanny resemblance to British Colonel MacKenzie. Williams, also a master of imitation and disguise, is asked to impersonate the Colonel, ostensibly to allow the Colonel to make a secret trip East. What Williams is not told is that the Colonel has recently been a target of assassins. After the Colonel's plane goes down, the plan changes and Williams maintains the disguise to confuse the Nazis about D-Day.
A team of allied saboteurs are assigned an impossible mission: infiltrate an impregnable Nazi-held island and destroy the two enormous long-range field guns that prevent the rescue of 2,000 trapped British soldiers.
Lieutenant Rip Crandall is hoodwinked into taking command of the "Wackiest Ship in the Navy" – a real garbage scow with a crew of misfits who don't know a jib from a jigger. What none of them knows, including Crandall, is that this ship has a very important top-secret mission to complete in waters patrolled by the Japanese fleet. Their mission will save hundreds of allied lives – if only they can get there in one piece.
OSS agent, working with the French underground, ambushes Nazi convoy with high-ranking general, who escapes. Later they take him from a Nazi prison and smuggle him to England.
The rebellious Thracian Spartacus, born and raised a slave, is sold to Gladiator trainer Batiatus. After weeks of being trained to kill for the arena, Spartacus turns on his owners and leads the other slaves in rebellion. As the rebels move from town to town, their numbers swell as escaped slaves join their ranks. Under the leadership of Spartacus, they make their way to southern Italy, where they will cross the sea and return to their homes.
"Under Ten Flags" is a WWII movie loosely based on the true story of the German navy commerce raider Atlantis, a converted Auxilliary Cruiser, and her Captain Bernhard Rogge. Atlantis, camouflaged as a merchant ship, cruised the South Seas ( Atlantic, Indian & Pacific) and sank or captured 22 merchant ships from May 1940 through November 22, 1941 when she was sunk by the British Cruiser HMS Devonshire. Rogge was one of the few German officers of flag rank who were not arrested by the Allies after the war ended. This was due to the very proper and ethical way he exercised his command of Atlantis. After the war he advanced to Rear Admiral in the West German Navy and became a high-ranking NATO commander.
During the Korean War, the lieutenant in charge of a Marine rifle platoon is killed in battle. Before he dies, he places the platoon's sergeant, who's black, in charge. The sergeant figures on having trouble with two men in his platoon: a private who has much more combat experience than he does, and a racist Southerner who doesn't like blacks in the first place and has no intention of taking orders from one.
Based on the story about Guy Gabaldon, a Los Angeles Hispanic boy raised in the 1930s by a Japanese-American foster family. After Pearl Harbor, his foster family is interned at the Manzanar camp for Japanese Americans, while he enlists in the Marines, where his ability to speak Japanese becomes a vital asset. During the Battle of Saipan, he convinces 800 Japanese to surrender after their general commits suicide.
An American patrol has to cross behind enemy lines by skis in order to blow up an important railroad bridge. The task is made harder by conflicts between the platoon's veteran sergeant and its inexperienced lieutenant and by constant attacks by pursuing German troops.