1. BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI

Is it better to do a good job, or a good thing? What is pride? Standing up for yourself, or proving yourself? And what happens when these concepts conflict? That is the beauty of this movie. Should you do the work of your enemy, if only to show them you can do it better than they, or do you refuse and fight back? Either way, lives will be lost, men will suffer. While not incredibly accurate, historically, it is still one hell of a movie.

2. THE GREAT ESCAPE

Every good war movie is about something beyond fighting the bad guy. Here we have a story about ingenuity and survival. Based on a book of anecdotes about life in a prison camp, you learn how the mind can never be imprisoned. These POW's would devise scheme after scheme to escape, make life easier for them, or worse for their captors. While many of the plans didn't work, sometimes with tragic results, the plans, the schemes, the thinking was enough to pass the time and keep their spirits alive.

3. SCHINDLER'S LIST

Spielberg's last great film. What is the worth of life? We watch as one man goes from turning a blind eye to the pain and suffering of millions of innocents to looking at every little thing he owns and thinking it could have saved more, if only he had tried harder, seen it sooner. We also see how little human life can mean to some people. It took a long time to be able to watch Ralph Fiennes without hating him.

4. STALAG 17

William Holden IS WWII if you ask me. I also never really studied history too good. Or English. I did study theater, and got to be in this play, which was the basis of the movie, which was loosly the basis of "Hogan's Heroes." It's an excellent ensemble piece, more about the spirit of survival and trust than explosions, like modern war movies tend to be. It also can be quite funny at times.

5. 1941

Okay, a war movie with no real message. Not really plot driven, either. Just a whole lot of big spectacle. A ferris wheel rolls off a pier, a giant fight breaks out between the branches of our military, and Ned Beatty tries to blow up Christopher Lee. Dan Aykroyd goes insane, while Robert Stack loses his grip on reality, while John Belushi...uh, okay. I found a theme. War is madness. Not the 80's ska band, but sheer madness.

1. SCHINDLER'S LIST

If you offered me dollar to tell you what I thought was the best film ever made I would say it was "Schindler's List". Now that I've published that information I am likely to recieve few dollars for it. Oh well. Spielberg's masterpiece is as glorious as it was risky. Making a black and white film in the early ninties wasn't exactly considered box office gold. Once again, moviegoers proved smarter than a numbers obsessed Hollywood will ever give them credit for and pushed "Schindler's List" close to the $100 million mark. Spielberg captured the whole of the war, the mass destruction and still gave you focus on the individual stories that existed and have been forever erased. The film is simply perfect.

2. AU REVIOR, LES ENFANTS

Louis Malle's tale of French school children who find themselves face to face with the genocidal horrors of World War II is one of the saddest films I've ever had the pleasure to see. The children in the cast all give amazing performances, even outdoing their adult co-stars. One of the few films to ever explore the wars effect on the kids it provides a thought provoking new slant on the subject.

3. LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL

This Italian film about a loving father who hides his son both physically and literally from within a Nazi Concentration Camp takes a high risk gamble on injecting a note of a humor to the tragedies of the Holocaust. It failed before with that infamous Jerry Lewis film and after, Robin Williams blantantly exploitive "Jakob the Liar". It's Roberto Begnini that makes the thing work. He plays the situation not directly for laughs, but for the mental survival of his young son. He mixes the comedy with the proper seriousness and respect that keeps the movie from being offensive.

4. EUROPA, EUROPA

"Europa, Europa" tells the true story of Solomon Perel, a Jewish boy in war torn Europe who's father instructs him to "survive at any cost". He does so by posing as a German soldier and managing his way through the war. This is the third foriegn language film on my list. I just think that the stories from Europe are more intimate, after all the whole of the continent had to endure and rebuild from this great war. Here in America, we fought yes, but those involved were primarily military. World War II was seen as "Europe's problem" and many Americans still held their own anti-semetic views. The other two films on my list were created by a Jew and a Frenchman. I don't know that a non-Jewish American will be able to create a work with the power of these films.

5. ENEMY AT THE GATES

Jean-Jaques Annaud's film about a Russian sharpshooter that brings hope to his nation's army is a powerful film that chronicals one of the many stories of real life heroes in the battle against The Third Reich. Solid acting and engossing cinematography help this film rise to the top of the war movie heap. Discredited by some critics as having a weak screenplay, I think it was more a victim of prejudice against a delayed film. For some reason critics feel the need to trash ANY delayed or rescheduled film and deny it it's proper due (see also: "Waterworld"). This film is spectacular and will recieve it's credit in time.

1. SCHINDLER'S LIST

Well, come on, do I have to explain why?

2. THE GREAT ESCAPE

Back when it wasn't an unconscionable thing to make something of a gung-ho war flick (and I'm not saying it's a bad thing that the tide has shifted the way it has), there was a slew of rah-rah, let's-go-get-'em flicks that ultimately are fairly well interchangeable. But then there's this one, with it's top-of-the-line ensemble - most notably Steve McQueen, James Coburn, Richard Attenborough and James Garner - which adds an admirable grain of desperation to the generally pleasant wartime escapism.

3. EMPIRE OF THE SUN

Everybody gives Schindler all the credit for being the earmark of Spielberg's maturation as a filmmaker (including, well, all of us here at DSFC), but honestly, this 1987 masterpiece, hot on the heels of his first "grown-up" movie, The Color Purple, lays the groundwork for his later successes, with stirring imagery, music, and an excellent debut performance by Christian Bale.

4. HOPE & GLORY

A story along much the same lines as Empire of the Sun - WWII from the perspective of a boy - but with a completely different tone and personality. A semiautobiographical look at director John Boorman's youth in London during the German blitz, Hope is by turns funny, bracing, and thoroughly amazing.

5. PATTON

I didn't really wanna put this one on here, but last night, the ghosts of George Patton and George C. Scott visited me and threatened to kick me in the nuts if I didn't. Okay, seriously, I'm the last person to support pro-war movies, but that can be overlooked in this case if only for Scott's brilliant, Oscar-snubbing performance as the thoroughly insane general.