Storming the stores

Call it the invasion of the World War II movies on DVD. With the 60th anniversary of D-day this Sunday, studios have mined their vaults for WWII films. Many of them are classics; others would have been better left gathering dust. Most of them are new to DVD, though a few are being re-released as special editions. All of them demonstrate -- sometimes graphically -- that war is hell.

Despite the D-day tie-in, only one of the films, “Saving Private Ryan,” deals with the invasion of Normandy. DreamWorks’ commemorative edition of Steven Spielberg’s Oscar-winning 1998 epic ($27) features several behind-the-scenes documentaries, an introduction to the film by Spielberg and clips of two World War II films he made as a kid.

Here’s a reconnaissance report on the rest of the films, in order of their theatrical release:

“Wake Island” (Universal, $15) was one of the first World War II films produced by Hollywood. Released in August 1942, the drama chronicled the exploits of a band of Marine Corps troops who died defending the sandbar in the Pacific soon after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. Robert Preston and William Bendix star.

“Crash Dive” ($15), Fox’s gung-ho 1943 sub flick, was one of the few war movies made in Technicolor. By the time the film was released, leading man Tyrone Power had joined the Marines and was serving in the Pacific. “Crash Dive” comes to life during the sub sequences but grinds to a halt when it focuses on a love triangle among Power, Anne Baxter and Dana Andrews.

Cary Grant is a brave submarine commander in 1944’s taut action film “Destination Tokyo” (Warner, $20). Deftly directed by Delmer Daves, “Destination Tokyo” follows the crew of a U.S. sub sent to Tokyo Bay to gather information for Lt. Col. James Doolittle’s raid on Tokyo. The film also stars John Garfield.

Though John Wayne didn’t enlist in the armed services during World War II, the Duke supplied a lot of two-fisted action in numerous films about the conflict. Warner Home Video is offering two of his WWII movies ($20 each): 1945’s “Back to Bataan” and 1951’s “Flying Leathernecks.” The former is a passable action-drama set in the Philippines after the islands’ fall to the Japanese, the latter is entertaining but predictable.

William Wellman, a World War I veteran who directed the first Oscar-winning best film, “Wings,” helmed 1949’s “Battleground” (Warner, $20), one of the first combat films produced after the war. Van Johnson, John Hodiak and James Whitmore headline this drama about U.S. soldiers who fought the Germans at the Battle of Bastogne. It was nominated for six Oscars, including best picture.

Baby-faced Audie Murphy was World War II’s most decorated American soldier, and he went on to become a Hollywood actor. Universal Studios generally cast him in B westerns, but he got the A treatment in 1955 with “To Hell and Back” (Universal, $15). Murphy plays himself in this engrossing adaptation of his autobiography.

Robert Mitchum and Curt Jurgens are perfectly cast in 1957’s action film “The Enemy Below” (Fox, $15). Smartly directed by Dick Powell, “Enemy Below” finds Mitchum as the sensitive commander of a destroyer who must play cat-and-mouse games with a German sub commanded by Jurgens, tired of war and the Nazi regime.

Avoid the 1962 Jeffrey Hunter melodrama “No Man Is an Island” (Universal, $15). The low-budget film finds Hunter playing George Tweed, a real-life U.S. sailor trapped on Guam shortly after the Japanese invasion.

“The Great Escape” (MGM, $20) from 1963 may not be the greatest World War II film ever made, but it’s one of those films that gets better with every viewing. Directed by John Sturges, it made a superstar out of Steven McQueen as the “Cooler King.” The new two-disc collector’s set includes five well-crafted featurettes; a documentary, “The Great Escape: The Untold Story”; a photo gallery; a trivia track; and commentary with the late Sturges and James Coburn, as well as James Garner, David McCallum and others.

Marlon Brando and Yul Brynner don’t make very convincing Germans in 1965’s “Morituri” (Fox, $15). Nevertheless, the thriller about a Nazi ship transporting rubber from Shanghai to Germany, with the British on its trail, is campy fun.

Considering Kurt Vonnegut’s surreal antiwar novel “Slaughterhouse-Five” is basically impossible to translate to film, director George Roy Hill almost manages to pull it off in this 1972 adaptation. Michael Sachs plays Billy Pilgrim, the bland hero who keeps shifting from the present, where he is a middle-aged man with a wife and two obnoxious teenage children, to a future in outer space, to the past, when he was imprisoned in a German POW camp.

The theatrical version and director’s cut of Wolfgang Petersen’s 1982 German submarine film, “Das Boot,” have already been released on DVD; now added to the mix is the “Original Uncut Version” (Columbia TriStar, $40). This two-disc set features the five-hour miniseries, which originally aired on German TV. It’s terrific -- the extra footage adds texture to the story and dimension to the characters.

Television quite literally doesn’t make them anymore like “The Winds of War” (Paramount, $80). But back in 1983, the year this adaptation of Herman Wouk’s novel aired on ABC, the miniseries format was still enormously popular. This 15-hour extravaganza about the life and loves of a military family, produced and directed by Dan Curtis, was one of the most successful in TV history. The six-disc DVD set features three retrospective documentaries. It’s an addictive wallow.