Each year on November 11th, we pay tribute to the men and women who have served in the United States Armed Forces. Including classics, modern films, and documentaries, this list of ten films demonstrates the unique and diverse perspectives of veterans throughout American history.
Born on the Fourth of July
Based on the memoir by combat veteran Ron Kovic, 1989's Born on the Fourth of July stars Tom Cruise as Kovic, whose gunshot wound in Vietnam left him paralyzed from the chest down. A powerfully intimate portrait that unfolds on an epic scale, the film benefits from Cruise's uncompromising Oscar-nominated performance that captures one man's personal anguish and political awakening.
Read our review of Born on the Fourth of July
Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1
Goosenberg Kent's HBO-aired documentary focuses on the work of the Veterans Crisis Line in upstate New York, which offers telephone assistance to wounded warriors who are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and dealing with crises ranging from alcohol and drug dependence to homelessness. Although relatively short, Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1 offers a vivid reminder of the continuing (yet often ignored) challenges faced by combat vets.
Read our review of Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1
The Deer Hunter
Robert De Niro, John Savage, and Christopher Walken play three buddies from a Pennsylvania steel town, drafted in the 1960s and sent to Vietnam, where shattering experiences irrevocably alter their lives. Intense, powerful, and fascinating, 1978's The Deer Hunter not only rates highly among those distinctive ‘70s films that changed the way Hollywood made movies, it offers a look at some of cinema's most popular and talented performers in their salad days, displaying the promise that each of them ultimately fulfilled.
Read our review of Deer Hunter
The Dirty Dozen
This "they don't make 'em like this anymore" ripping yarn stars Lee Marvin in the "war is hell but ain't it fun nonetheless" role of a grizzled WWII major assigned the unenviable task of whipping a squad of criminal misfits into war heroes for a D-Day eve suicide mission behind enemy lines. This 1967 wartime actioner sporting a very good video transfer remains a real crowd-pleaser.
Read our review of The Dirty Dozen
Showing 11/11 on TCM
Flags of Our Fathers
The iconic photo of American soldiers raising Old Glory at Iwo Jima serves as the springboard for Clint Eastwood's film adaptation of the bestselling book by James Bradley and Ron Powers, which unravels the tangled—and none too uplifting—reality behind the photograph (as well as the rather crass use of soldiers as PR puppets in a desperate War Bond drive), while simultaneously exalting the true heroism shown by the men who fought and died to take the island.
Read our review of Flags of Our Fathers
Hell and Back Again
Danfung Dennis's Hell and Back Again, which won two awards at last year's Sundance Film Festival and garnered a nomination for Best Documentary at this year's Academy Awards, focuses on Sgt. Nathan Harris of the U.S. Marines Echo Company, who is injured in battle in Afghanistan and returns to his North Carolina home to recover from injuries to his hip and leg.
Read our review of Hell and Back Again
In the Valley of Elah
Tommy Lee Jones plays Vietnam vet Hank Deerfield, a proud and patriotic Tennessee laborer who reacts impulsively to a call from the Army that his son Mike, just back from a tour in Iraq, has gone AWOL from his squad at Fort Rudd. In the Valley of Elah isn't an easy movie to watch, however viewers would mostly likely admit that they've just seen a powerful and affecting movie.
Read our review of In the Valley of Elah
Maya Lin: A Strong Clear Vision
Although the works--the Vietnam Veterans Memorial and the Civil Rights Memorial, among others--starkly portray the true spoils of war, whether foreign or domestic, architect Maya Lin's "strong clear vision" embodied in these works is a hyper-personalized tribute to "the people." Her simple, yet eloquent, memorials invite not the traditional stand-in-awe-and-admire response, but rather a tactile engagement: visitors' fingers trace the names of the fallen carved on national elegies.
Read our review of Maya Lin: A Strong Clear Vision
Mister Roberts
At the time of its 1948 Broadway premiere, Joshua Logan's adaptation of Thomas Heggen's novel about an idealistic lieutenant on a navy cargo ship in the Pacific during WWII, who does battle with his tyrannical captain while seeking transfer to combat duty, still had a real sense of immediacy.
Read our review of Mister Roberts
Showing 11/11 on TCM
Stray Dog
Debra Granik's PBS-aired Independent Lens documentary focuses on a Vietnam vet trying to make a good life for himself and the people around him. Ron "Stray Dog" Hall, who appeared in Granik's fiction film Winter's Bone, manages an RV park in Branson, MO, sharing a double-wide with his Mexican wife, Alicia, and their little dogs. An engaging portrait of an interesting American character, this is recommended.
Check out our review of Stray Dog