Ranking Hollywood’s Depictions of the Horrors of War

In terms of graphic horror and shocking visual images, there’s never been a war movie quite like Steven Spielberg’s “Saving Private Ryan.”

The film, which opens today, is a far cry from the majority of war films--especially the propaganda movies of World War II--which were made to boost the country’s spirits and encourage young men to enlist.

But over the decades, there have been numerous films that attempted to capture the intensity, carnage, fear and unbridled heroism of war. (Interestingly, many of the most emotionally devastating films were about World War I, which is often viewed as an example of meaningless slaughter.)

Because of censorship restraints, some of these films couldn’t be as graphic as such recent war films as Oliver Stone’s “Born on the Fourth of July” and “Platoon” and Stanley Kubrick’s “Full Metal Jacket.”

Below are some of the memorable films made about World Wars I and II, and the Vietnam and Korean wars. The intensity level is rated on a scale of 1 to 4, with 4 being the most intense. (The * next to the year denotes video availability.

WORLD WAR II

Movie: “Attack!” (1956)*

Director: Robert Aldrich

Terrific study of infantry warfare in Europe, circa 1944. The most notable scene finds Jack Palance being crushed by a German tank, but still managing to find the strength--even without the use of his arms--to track down the cowardly captain (Eddie Albert) who led his men to their death. The horrific expression on the dead Palance’s face has to be seen to be believed.

Intensity Level: 3

Movie: “Battleground” (1949)*

Director: William A. Wellman

Spielberg cites this Oscar-winning classic as one of the best World War II films. Wellman, who directed “Wings” and himself was a flying ace in World War I, directed this powerful story about a squad of American foot soldiers from all walks of life trying to survive after they are trapped in Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge in 1944. The battle sequences are realistic for the time perhaps because screenwriter Robert Pirosh served in Bastogne.

Intensity Level: 2 1/2

Movie: “The Longest Day” (1962)*

Directors: Andrew Marton, Ken Annakin, Bernard Wicki

Mammoth, all-star dramatization of D-day invasion was a pet project of producer Darryl Zanuck. No expense was spared to ensure that the battle sequences were as realistic as possible for its day. One of the most memorable scenes features Red Buttons as a soldier whose parachute has trapped him in the roof of a church--who must helplessly watch his fellow paratroopers being gunned down by the Germans.

Intensity Level: 2 1/2

Movie: “Merrill’s Marauders” (1962)*

Director: Samuel Fuller

World War II vet Fuller made several war films during his career, including “The Steel Helmet,” “Fixed Bayonets” and “The Big Red One.” The gritty “Marauders,” set in Burma in 1944, isn’t as violent as contemporary films but features many realistic and suspenseful battle scenes as it follows a battalion of U.S. soldiers fighting fatigue, hunger and disease as they push behind Japanese enemy lines. Along the way, the battalion encounters snipers, mines and skirmishes before it engages in a magnificently staged, full-scale, brutal battle with the Japanese at a rail yard.

Intensity Level: 2 1/2

Movie: “When Trumpets Fade” (1998)

Director: John Irvin

HBO’s recent drama deals with a three-month meaningless battle in the winter of 1944-45 on the Belgian-German border that left more than 24,000 dead or wounded. Irvin, who also directed the bloody 1987 Vietnam actioner “Hamburger Hill,” doesn’t spare viewers from the horrors of war. The opening scene features a private (Ron Eldard) carrying a wounded man through the woods. The soldier, though, is in too much pain to continue--the skin of the left side of his face is missing--so the private puts him out of his misery. The graphically realistic battle sequences feature limbs hanging from trees and extreme bloodshed. A scene in which one of the young soldiers screams as he’s engulfed in flames is not for the squeamish.

Intensity Level: 4

VIETNAM WAR

Movie: “Born on the Fourth of July” (1989)*

Director: Oliver Stone

Stone’s Oscar-winning biopic on Vietnam vet Ron Kovic (Tom Cruise) features two gripping battle sequences--one in which Kovic and company accidentally kill women and children in a village. While escaping that village, Kovic mistakenly kills his own man. During another brutal skirmish, Kovic is ripped apart--in slow-motion--by gunfire that renders him a paraplegic.

Intensity Level: 3

Movie: “Casualties of War” (1989)*

Director: Brian De Palma

De Palma’s Vietnam study features a plethora of grim battle sequences. In one scene a soldier (Darren Burrows) walks on a mine, flies through the air and lands on several wooden stakes. The most numbing scene deals with a young Vietnamese woman who is stabbed numerous times by a soldier. Because she doesn’t die of her massive stomach wounds, she is ultimately shot to shreds by several soldiers as she walks toward them bleeding and crying in pain.

Intensity Level: 3 1/2

Movie: “The Deer Hunter” (1978)*

Director: Michael Cimino

The Vietnam sequences in Cimino’s Oscar-winning epic still pack a wallop: A Viet Cong soldier tosses a grenade in an underground hiding place filled with women and children and shoots a crying woman and her baby. Of course, the Russian roulette scenes in which Robert De Niro, John Savage and Christopher Walken are forced by their sadistic captors to play the deadly game are still the most gruesome aspects of the film. Another bloodcurdling scene features a rat chewing on Savage’s face while he’s being held prisoner in a watery pit.

Intensity Level: 4

Movie: “Platoon” (1986)*

Director: Oliver Stone

Stone’s Oscar-winning depiction of the Vietnam conflict features numerous in-your-face battle sequences filled with spurting blood, missing limbs, etc. Particularly gruesome moments include Tom Berenger being shot by Charlie Sheen and Kevin Dillon using the butt of his gun to crush the skull of a villager. Instead of showing the man’s crushed skull, Stone has the villager’s blood splatter over the soldiers’ faces.

Intensity Level: 4

KOREAN WAR

Movie: “MASH” (1970)*

Director: Robert Altman

Back in 1970, Altman’s Oscar-winning black comedy warranted an R-rating due not only to the language and mature situations but also the extremely bloody surgery scenes. Though now rated PG, those scenes, like sawing off someone’s leg juxtaposed with dark humor, still cause a chill to go up your spine.

Intensity Level: 2

Movie: “Men in War” (1957)*

Director: Anthony Mann

Taut little film about a platoon of soldiers, led by grizzled Robert Ryan, surrounded by the enemy and their attempts to get back to their own line. Ryan’s men are decimated by snipers, mines and bombs. The final battle sequence between Ryan’s men and the North Koreans is a corker.

Intensity Level: 3

WORLD WAR I

Movie: “All Quiet on the Western Front” (1930)*

Director: Lewis Milestone

Get out your hankies for this bravura antiwar film based on Erich Maria Remarque’s novel that looks at the war through the eyes of a young German soldier (Lew Ayres). The gung-ho private turns into a world-weary veteran as one by one he sees his friends being blown up, bombed or felled by machine gun fire. One of the grimmest scenes occurs when Ayres must share a foxhole during a night attack with the dying French soldier he has stabbed.

Intensity Level: 3

Movie: “Gallipoli” (1981)*

Director: Peter Weir

Weir offers a harrowing depiction of the World War I battle that found Australian soldiers being sent to their deaths against the stronger and better equipped Turkish troops. Watching the rows of young men being mowed down by machine gun fire as soon as they leave the trenches is a heart-sickening experience. The finale featuring star Mark Lee being shot in the chest as he runs toward the Turkish troops is one of cinema’s classic moments.

Intensity Level: 3 1/2

Movie: “King and Country” (1964)*

Director: Joseph Losey

Depressing drama about a young soldier (Tom Courtney) on trial for desertion. Losey uses vintage photographs to illustrate the carnage. One graphic sequence finds the members of the squad slamming shovels into the stomach of a dead horse in order to flush out the rats hiding in the horse. They have their own mock trial and stone one of the rats to death. After a firing squad fails to kill Courtney, his attorney (Dirk Bogarde) is forced to shoot him in the mouth to finish the job.

Intensity Level: 3 1/2

Movie: “Paths of Glory” (1957)*

Director: Stanley Kubrick

Kubrick took on the Vietnam War in 1987’s “Full Metal Jacket,” but this antiwar film is far better. Kirk Douglas is forced to lead his decimated troops into battle against an impregnable German outpost. When the soldiers refuse to fight, three of the squad are put on trial and sentenced to death for cowardice. Kubrick captures the brutality and intensity of the battle through his sweeping dolly and tracking shots as the men are furiously ravaged by machine gun fire, shrapnel, grenades and mines.

Intensity Level: 4