World War II in chronological order (1 September 1939 - 2 September 1945) (Unfinished)
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- DirectorRoman PolanskiStarsAdrien BrodyThomas KretschmannFrank FinlayDuring WWII, acclaimed Polish musician Wladyslaw faces various struggles as he loses contact with his family. As the situation worsens, he hides in the ruins of Warsaw in order to survive.1 September 1939 (Invasion of Poland)
POV: Civilian (Polish / Jewish)
Władysław Szpilman (5 December 1911 – 6 July 2000) was a Polish pianist and classical composer of Jewish descent who survived the German occupation of Warsaw and the Holocaust.
Confined within the Warsaw ghetto after the German invasion of Poland, Szpilman spent two years in hiding. Towards the end of his concealment, he was helped by a German officer who had become disillusioned with the Nazi party. - DirectorTom HooperStarsColin FirthGeoffrey RushHelena Bonham CarterThe story of King George VI, his unexpected ascension to the throne of the British Empire in 1936, and the speech therapist who helped the unsure monarch overcome his stammer.3 September 1939 (British declaration of war)
POV: Allied (UK) - DirectorOliver HirschbiegelStarsChristian FriedelKatharina SchüttlerBurghart KlaußnerIn November 1939, Georg Elser's attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler fails, and he is arrested. During his confinement, he recalls the events leading up to his plot and his reasons for deciding to take such drastic action.8 November 1939 (The Bürgerbräukeller Bombing)
POV: Resistance (Nazi Germany)
Johann Georg Elser (4 January 1903 – 9 April 1945), was a German worker who planned and carried out an elaborate assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler and other high-ranking Nazi leaders on 8 November 1939 at the Bürgerbräukeller in Munich (known as the Bürgerbräukeller Bombing).
Elser constructed and placed a bomb near the platform from which Hitler was to deliver a speech. It did not kill Hitler, who left earlier than expected, but it did kill 8 people and injured 62 others.
Elser was held as a prisoner for more than five years until he was executed at the Dachau concentration camp less than a month before the surrender of Nazi Germany. - DirectorPekka ParikkaStarsTaneli MäkeläVesa VierikkoTimo TorikkaIn 1939, two Finnish brothers are conscripted in the army to fight in the war between Finland and the Soviet Union.30 November 1939 – 13 March 1940 (The winter war)
POV: Axis* (Finland)
The Winter War (Finnish: Talvisota) was a war between the Soviet Union (USSR) and Finland.
It began with a Soviet invasion of Finland on 30 November 1939, three months after the outbreak of World War II, and ended three and a half months later with the Moscow Peace Treaty on 13 March 1940.
Despite superior military strength, especially in tanks and aircraft, the Soviet Union suffered severe losses and initially made little headway.
(Molotov cocktail)
A Molotov cocktail is a breakable glass bottle containing a flammable substance such as petrol (gasoline), alcohol, or a napalm-like mixture, with some motor oil added, and usually a source of ignition such as a burning cloth wick held in place by the bottle's stopper. The wick is usually soaked in alcohol or kerosene, rather than petrol (gasoline).
The name's origin came from the propaganda that Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov produced during the Winter War, mainly his declaration on Soviet state radio that bombing missions over Finland were actually airborne humanitarian food deliveries for their starving neighbours.
As a result, the Finns sarcastically dubbed the Soviet cluster bombs "Molotov bread baskets" in reference to Molotov's propaganda broadcasts.
When the hand-held bottle firebomb was developed to attack Soviet tanks, the Finns called it the "Molotov cocktail", as "a drink to go with his food parcels".
*Although Finland never signed the Tripartite Pact, it fought against the Soviet Union alongside Germany in the 1941-44 Continuation War, during which the official position of the wartime Finnish government was that Finland was a co-belligerent of the Germans who they described as "brothers-in-arms". - DirectorWang GenfaShanghai, 1939. A sad violin tune plays throughout the city. Little Rina and her younger brother Mishalli have fled to Shanghai from Europe, waiting to be reunited with their parents.Winter 1939 (Shanghai Ghetto)
POV: Civilian (Chinese / Jewish)
The Shanghai Ghetto, formally known as the Restricted Sector for Stateless Refugees, was an area of approximately one square mile in the Hongkew district of Japanese-occupied Shanghai.
After the Nazis were elected to power in 1933, the state-sponsored anti-Semitic persecution such as the Nuremberg Laws (1935) and the Kristallnacht (1938) drove masses of German Jews to seek asylum abroad, with over 304,500 German Jews choosing to emigrate, 1933-1939.
The first German Jewish refugees—twenty-six families, among them five well-known physicians—had already arrived in Shanghai by November 1933. By the spring of 1934, there were reportedly eighty refugee physicians, surgeons, and dentists in China. On August 15, 1938, the first Jewish refugees from Anschluss Austria arrived by Italian ship. Most of the refugees arrived after Kristallnacht. - DirectorAndrzej WajdaStarsAndrzej ChyraMaja OstaszewskaArtur ZmijewskiAn examination of the Soviet slaughter of thousands of Polish officers and citizens in the Katyn forest in 1940.April–May 1940 (Katyn massacre)
POV: Allied (Poland)
The Katyn massacre was a series of mass executions of nearly 22,000 Polish military officers and intelligentsia carried out by the USSR, specifically the NKVD ("People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs", the Soviet secret police) in April and May 1940.
The USSR claimed the Nazis had killed the victims, and it continued to deny responsibility for the massacres until 1990, when it officially acknowledged and condemned the killings by the NKVD, as well as the subsequent cover-up by the Soviet government. - DirectorRoni EzraStarsPilou AsbækLars MikkelsenJoachim FjelstrupOn April 9, 1940 Germany invaded Denmark. Based on real events - in Southern Jutland a military unit on bicycles was sent south to help hold back the Germans until reinforcement.9 April 1940 (Operation Weserübung)
POV: Allied (Denmark)
Strategically, Denmark's importance to Germany was as a staging area for operations in Norway, and also as a border nation to Germany which would have to be controlled in some way.
Given Denmark's position on the Baltic Sea, the country was also crucial for the control of naval and shipping access to major German and Soviet harbours.
The invasion of Denmark lasted less than six hours and was the shortest military campaign conducted by the Germans during the war. - DirectorErik PoppeStarsJesper ChristensenAnders BaasmoKarl MarkovicsApril 1940. Norway has been invaded by Germany and the royal family and government have fled into the interior. The German envoy to Norway tries to negotiate a peace. Ultimately, the decision on Norway's future will rest with the king.9 April 1940 (Operation Weserübung)
POV: Allied (Norway)
Norway was important to Germany for two primary reasons: as a base for naval units, including U-boats, to harass Allied shipping in the North Atlantic, and to secure shipments of iron ore from Sweden through the port of Narvik.
The long northern coastline was an excellent place to launch U-boat operations into the North Atlantic to attack British commerce. Germany was dependent on iron ore from Sweden and was worried, with justification, that the Allies would attempt to disrupt those shipments, 90% of which originating from Narvik.
By holding Norway, the Danish straits and most of the shores of the Baltic Sea, the Third Reich encircled Sweden from the north, the west and the south. - DirectorJoachim RønningEspen SandbergStarsAksel HennieAgnes KittelsenNicolai Cleve BrochThe true story about one of the most brilliant saboteurs during World War II and his battle to overcome his inner demons.9 April 1940-1945
POV: Resistance (Norway)
Maximo "Max" Manus (9 December 1914 – 20 September 1996) was a Norwegian resistance fighter during World War II, specialising in sabotage in occupied Norway. - DirectorLeslie NormanStarsJohn MillsRichard AttenboroughBernard LeeA dramatization of the British Expeditionary Force's 1940 retreat to the beaches of France and the extraordinary seaborne evacuation that saved it from utter destruction by Nazi Germany.26 May – 4 June 1940 (Battle of Dunkirk)
POV: Allied (UK)
The Dunkirk evacuation, code-named Operation Dynamo and also known as the Miracle of Dunkirk, was the evacuation of Allied soldiers during the battle of Dunkirk.
The operation commenced after large numbers of Belgian, British, and French troops were cut off and surrounded by German troops during the six-week Battle of France. In a speech to the House of Commons, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill called this "a colossal military disaster", saying "the whole root and core and brain of the British Army" had been stranded at Dunkirk and seemed about to perish or be captured.
However thanks to a combination of German strategical errors, the royal navy and civilian aid over 400,000 British troops managed to evacuate which far exceeded anyone's expectations. - DirectorGuy HamiltonStarsMichael CaineTrevor HowardHarry AndrewsIn 1940, the British Royal Air Force fights a desperate battle to prevent the Luftwaffe from gaining air superiority over the English Channel as a prelude to a possible Axis invasion of the U.K.10 July – 31 October 1940 (Battle of Britain)
POV: Allied (UK) - DirectorRoy Ward BakerStarsHardy KrügerColin GordonMichael GoodliffeA cocky German fighter pilot is shot down over England in 1940 and makes numerous attempts to escape to fight again.10 July – 31 October 1940 (Battle of Britain)
POV: Axis (Nazi Germany)
Franz Xaver Baron von Werra (13 July 1914 – 25 October 1941) was a German fighter pilot and flying ace who was shot down over Britain and captured. - DirectorGiuseppe De SantisStarsArthur KennedyZhanna ProkhorenkoRaffaele PisuChronicle of the unheralded and unsuccessful invasion of the Soviet Union by the Italian army during World War II.1941 (Italian participation in the Eastern Front)
POV: Axis (Italy)
From 1941 to 1943, the Italians maintained two units on the Eastern Front. The first Italian fighting force was a corps-sized formation called the Italian Expeditionary Corps in Russia (CSIR). The second force was a field army-sized formation which subsumed the CSIR, the Italian Army in Russia (ARMIR) that was also known as the Italian 8th Army.
Both fought on the southern part of the Eastern Front, participating in the German advance through the Ukraine to the Volga.
The Italian Army in Russia suffered heavy losses during the Battle of Stalingrad and was withdrawn to Italy in 1943. Only minor Italian units participated on the Eastern Front after that. - DirectorAku LouhimiesStarsEero AhoJohannes HolopainenJussi VatanenA film adaptation of Väinö Linna's best selling novel The Unknown Soldier (1954) and the novel's unedited manuscript version, Sotaromaani.June 1941 (The continuation War)
POV: Axis (Finland)
The Continuation War began 15 months after the end of the Winter War, also fought between Finland and the USSR. - StarsVolker BruchTom SchillingKatharina SchüttlerFive friends go out to war and promise each other to be back for Christmas.POV: Axis (Nazi Germany)
Campaign: Eastern Front
Episode 1 / 2 - 22 June–5 December 1941 (Operation Barbarossa)
Episode 3 - 16 April–2 May 1945 (Battle of Berlin) - DirectorMikhail KalatozovStarsTatyana SamoylovaAleksey BatalovVasiliy MerkurevVeronica plans a rendezvous with her lover, Boris, at the bank of river, only for him to be drafted into World War II shortly thereafter.22 June – 5 December 1941 (Operation Barbarossa)
POV: Allied (USSR) - DirectorSergey MokritskiyStarsYuliya PeresildEvgeniy TsyganovOleg VasilkovA story of Lyudmila Pavlichenko, the most successful female sniper in history.The lead up to 22 June 1941 - 1942 (Siege of Sevastopol)
POV: Allied (USSR) - DirectorAleksandr KottStarsAleksey KopashovAndrey MerzlikinPavel DerevyankoA war drama set during the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941, in which Soviet troops held on to a border stronghold for nine days.22–29 June 1941 (Battle of Brest fortress)
POV: Allied / Civilian (USSR) - DirectorAndrey MalyukovStarsDmitriy MedvedevMilena Tskhovrebova-ArganovichAleksey BuldakovIn the autumn of 1941, the last defender of the Brest fortress continues a fight against the German invaders.22–29 June 1941 (Battle of Brest fortress)
POV: Allied / Civilian (USSR) - DirectorLarisa ShepitkoStarsBoris PlotnikovVladimir GostyukhinSergey YakovlevTwo Soviet partisans on a mission to gather food contend with the winter cold, the occupying Germans, and their own psyches.After 22 June 1941 (Eastern front)
POV: Allied (USSR) - DirectorAndrei TarkovskyEduard AbalovStarsNikolay BurlyaevValentin ZubkovEvgeniy ZharikovDuring WWII, Soviet orphan Ivan Bondarev strikes up a friendship with three sympathetic Soviet officers while working as a scout behind the German lines.After 22 June 1941 – 25 May 1945 (Eastern Front)
POV: Allied (USSR)
A number of child soldiers served in the Soviet Union's armed forces during World War II. In some cases, orphans also unofficially joined the Soviet Red Army. Such children were affectionately known as "son of the regiment" (Russian: сын полка) and sometimes willingly performed military missions such as reconnaissance.
Officially, the age of military conscription was lowered to 18 for those without secondary education and 19 for those who had been educated beyond that. In 1943 and 1944, 16-17 years old teenagers (born 1926-7), many of Middle Asia, were drafted. These soldiers served in secondary units, not combat. Many were sent to the Far East, to replace units sent to the German front. After training and coming of age, the youth were sent too. - DirectorAleksandr BuravskiyStarsMira SorvinoArmin Mueller-StahlOlga SutulovaWinter, 1941. World War II rages on as Nazi troops invade the Soviet Union and besiege the devastated city of Leningrad. Foreign journalists are quickly evacuated, but in the chaos that ensues, Kate Davies is left behind.8 September 1941 – 27 January 1944 (Siege of Leningrad)
POV: Allied (USSR)
The siege began on 8 September 1941, when the Wehrmacht severed the last road to the city. Although Soviet forces managed to open a narrow land corridor to the city on 18 January 1943, the Red Army did not lift the siege until 27 January 1944, 872 days after it began.
The blockade became one of the longest and most destructive sieges in history, and it was possibly the costliest siege in history due to the number of casualties which were suffered during it.
In the 21st century some historians have classified it as a genocide due to the systematic starvation and intentional destruction of the city's civilian population. - DirectorWolfgang PetersenStarsJürgen ProchnowHerbert GrönemeyerKlaus WennemannA German U-boat stalks the frigid waters of the North Atlantic as its young crew experience the sheer terror and claustrophobic life of a submariner in World War II.October 1941 - 24 December 1941 (Battle of the Atlantic)
POV: Axis (Nazi Germany) - StarsHelmut HellstorffVyacheslav TikhonovArtyom KarapetyanThe battle of Moscow was the first major defeat of German Wehrmacht in the Second World War. The film is dedicated to some fighting events that took place in the USSR after Hitler's conquest of western Europe.2 October 1941 – 7 January 1942 (Battle of Moscow)
POV: Allied (USSR) - DirectorRichard FleischerKinji FukasakuToshio MasudaStarsMartin BalsamSô YamamuraJason RobardsThe story of the 1941 Japanese air raid on Pearl Harbor, and the series of preceding American blunders that aggravated its effectiveness.7 December 1941 (Attack on Pearl Harbor)
POV: Allied/Axis (USA/Japan)