Best movies like Grand Illusion
A Great Drama of Human Emotions
A unique, carefully handpicked, selection of the best movies like Grand Illusion Starring Jean Gabin, Pierre Fresnay, Erich von Stroheim, Marcel Dalio, and more. If you liked Grand Illusion then you may also like: The Unwritten Code, The Victors, Von Ryan's Express, The Wooden Horse, Nurse Edith Cavell and many more popular movies featured on this list. You can further filter the list even more or get a random selection from the list of similar movies, to make your selection even easier.
A group of French soldiers, including the patrician Captain de Boeldieu and the working-class Lieutenant Maréchal, grapple with their own class differences after being captured and held in a World War I German prison camp. When the men are transferred to a high-security fortress, they must concoct a plan to escape beneath the watchful eye of aristocratic German officer von Rauffenstein, who has formed an unexpected bond with de Boeldieu.
Grand Illusion
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The Victors
Intercutting dramatic vignettes with newsreel footage, the story follows the characters from an infantry squad as they make their way from Sicily to Germany during the end of World War II.
Von Ryan's Express
Von Ryan's Express stars Frank Sinatra as a POW colonel who leads a daring escape from WWII Italy by taking over a freight train, but he has to win over the British soldiers he finds himself commanding.
Nurse Edith Cavell
British nurse Edith Cavell is stationed at a hospital in Brussels during World War I. When the son of a former patient escapes from a German prisoner-of-war camp, she helps him flee to Holland. Outraged at the number of soldiers detained in the camps, Edith, along with a group of sympathizers, devises a plan to help the prisoners escape. As the group works to free the soldiers, Edith must keep her activities secret from the Germans
The Officers' Ward
The first days of WWI. Adrien, a young and handsome lieutenant, is wounded by a piece of shrapnel. He will spend the entire wartime at the Val-de-Grâce Hospital, in Paris. Five long years, and his life will change forever...
Rescue Dawn
A US Fighter pilot's epic struggle of survival after being shot down on a mission over Laos during the Vietnam War.
Mysterious Island
During the US Civil War, Union POWs escape in a balloon and end up stranded on a South Pacific island, inhabited by giant plants and animals. They must use their ingenuity to survive the dangers, and to devise a way to return home. Sequel to '20,000 Leagues Under the Sea' .
Aces High
The first World War is in its third year and aerial combat above the Western Front is consuming the nation's favored children at an appalling rate. By early 1917, the average life-span of a British pilot is less than a fortnight. Such losses place a fearsome strain on Gresham, commanding officer of the squadron. Aces High recreates the early days of the Royal Flying Corps with some magnificently staged aerial battles, and sensitive direction presents a moving portrayal of the futilities of war.
The Blue Max
A young pilot in the German air force of 1918, disliked as lower-class and unchivalrous, tries ambitiously to earn the medal offered for 20 kills.
The Captive Heart
A series of stories about the lives and loves of nine men in a Prisoner of War Camp over five years. Location shooting in the British occupied part of Germany adds believability. The main story is of Hasek (Redgrave) a Czech soldier who needs to keep his identity a secret from the Nazis, to do this he poses as a dead English Officer and corresponds with the man's wife. Upon liberation they meet and decide to continue their lives together. The other inmates' stories are revealed episodically.
The Colditz Story
Allied prisoners of various nationalities pool their resources to plan numerous escapes from an "escape-proof" German P.O.W. camp housed in a Medieval castle.
The Great Escape
The Nazis, exasperated at the number of escapes from their prison camps by a relatively small number of Allied prisoners, relocate them to a high-security 'escape-proof' camp to sit out the remainder of the war. Undaunted, the prisoners plan one of the most ambitious escape attempts of World War II. Based on a true story.
Cross of Iron
It is 1943, and the German army—ravaged and demoralised—is hastily retreating from the Russian front. In the midst of the madness, conflict brews between the aristocratic yet ultimately pusillanimous Captain Stransky and the courageous Corporal Steiner. Stransky is the only man who believes that the Third Reich is still vastly superior to the Russian army. However, within his pompous persona lies a quivering coward who longs for the Iron Cross so that he can return to Berlin a hero. Steiner, on the other hand is cynical, defiantly non-conformist and more concerned with the safety of his own men rather than the horde of military decorations offered to him by his superiors.
Danger Within
Drama set in an Italian prisoner of war camp during World War 2, where a group of British soldiers find their plans for escape thwarted by a mysterious traitor in their midst.
The Dawn Patrol
World War I ace Dick Courtney derides the leadership of his superior officer, but he soon is promoted to squadron commander and learns harsh lessons about sending subordinates to their deaths.
Paths of Glory
A commanding officer defends three scapegoats on trial for a failed offensive that occurred within the French Army in 1916.
The McKenzie Break
A German U-Boat commander and 600 prisoners plan a daring escape from a PoW camp in Scotland.
Escape to Victory
A group of POWs in a German prison camp during World War II play the German National Soccer Team in this powerful film depicting the role of prisoners during wartime.
Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence
Island of Java, 1942, during World War II. British Major Jack Celliers arrives at a Japanese prison camp, run by the strict Captain Yonoi. Colonel John Lawrence, who has a profound knowledge of Japanese culture, and Sergeant Hara, brutal and simpleton, will witness the struggle of wills between two men from very different backgrounds who are tragically destined to clash.
Hart's War
When Col. William McNamara is stripped of his freedom in a German POW camp, he's determined to keep on fighting even from behind enemy lines. Enlisting the help of a young lieutenant in a brilliant plot against his captors, McNamara risks everything on a mission to free his men and change the outcome of the war.
The Incident
Small town lawyer, Harmon Cobb, defends a Nazi prisoner of war against murder charges. Set during World War II, Cobb has to contend with the difficulties of defending the devil when the town's only doctor (Barnard Hughes) dies while at "Camp Bremen" in the fictitious town of Bremen, Colorado.
The Password Is Courage
Sergeant-Major Charles Coward, a brave British soldier is captured by German forces during World War II. When he's thrown into a prisoner of war camp, he immediately plans his escape. Masquerading as a wounded German soldier, he makes it as far as the medical tent, where the deceived enemy forces award him the Iron Cross. Though he is ultimately discovered, he goes on to courageously pursue his freedom with a whimsical and undying audacity.
Two Arabian Knights
During World War I, two American soldiers fight to escape the Germans while squabbling over a beautiful harem girl.
The Great Raid
As World War II rages, the elite Sixth Ranger Battalion is given a mission of heroic proportions: push 30 miles behind enemy lines and liberate over 500 American prisoners of war.
Captain Conan
The last days of World War I, Eastern front. Captain Conan, a lone wolf, a true warrior, leads a band of ruthless French fighters who love hand-to-hand combat; they are not fit for peacetime, they only feel really alive in the chaos of the battlefield.
Rocky Mountain
A Confederate troop, led by Captain Lafe Barstow, is prowling the far ranges of California and Nevada in a last desperate attempt to build up an army in the West for the faltering Confederacy. Because the patrol saves a stagecoach, with Johanna Carterr as one of the passengers, from an Indian attack, and is marooned on a rocky mountain, it fails in its mission but the honor of the Old South is upheld.
Battle of the Coral Sea
A US submarine and its crew are captured by the Japanese on the eve of a major WWII battle.
Now Where Did the Seventh Company Get to?
1940: During the chaotic running fights of the French army the 7th company disappears - nobody knows they've been taken captive. Only their scouting patrol, three witty but lazy guys, can escape and now wanders around behind the German lines. They'd like to just stay out the fights, but a Lieutenant urges them to use a captured truck to break through to their troops.
The One That Got Away
Based on the true story of Oberleutnant Franz von Werra, the only German prisoner of war captured in Britain to escape back to Germany during the Second World War.
The Birdmen
During WWII an American soldier sent to Norway to help with the escape of a scientist working on the atomic bomb for the Germans. Before they can escape they are captured and sent to a POW prison camp in an alpine castle. Cook must find a way to escape with the scientist before the Gestapo discover the Norwegian's true identity and convinces the other prisoners to build a two person glider in which they plan to escape.
The Cross of Lorraine
French soldiers (Jean-Pierre Aumont, Gene Kelly) surrender to lying Nazis and are herded into a barbaric prison camp.
The Last Blitzkrieg
The fanatical son of a Nazi General leads a squad of German commandos, disguised as American Troops, behind the lines in order to sabotage the Allied Forces.
The Case of Sergeant Grischa
This film earned an Oscar nomination for Sound Recording. It is the only film nominated in this category that is among the lost. No negative or print material is known to have survived. Contemporary reviews were scathing, describing the film as a vastly overlong and boring talk-fest.
Resisting Enemy Interrogation
A downed American bomber crew quickly falls prey to the clever interrogation techniques of the Germans in this dramatic training film.
A group of French soldiers, including the patrician Captain de Boeldieu and the working-class Lieutenant Maréchal, grapple with their own class differences after being captured and held in a World War I German prison camp. When the men are transferred to a high-security fortress, they must concoct a plan to escape beneath the watchful eye of aristocratic German officer von Rauffenstein, who has formed an unexpected bond with de Boeldieu.
Grand Illusion
A unique, carefully handpicked, selection of the best movies like Grand Illusion Starring Jean Gabin, Pierre Fresnay, Erich von Stroheim, Marcel Dalio, and more. If you liked Grand Illusion then you may also like: The Unwritten Code, The Victors, Von Ryan's Express, The Wooden Horse, Nurse Edith Cavell and many more popular movies featured on this list. You can further filter the list even more or get a random selection from the list of similar movies, to make your selection even easier.
The Unwritten Code
The Unwritten Code is an offbeat, better-than-average Columbia wartime "B" picture. Though Ann Savage and Tom Neal are top-billed, the central character is supporting-actor Roland Varno. He plays a Nazi spy who sneaks into the U.S., hoping to release hundreds of German prisoners. He fails, but not until plenty of bullets have been spent. The most interesting aspect of The Unwritten Code is the casting of Savage and Neal as the "good" characters: in 1945, these two cult favorites would play the decidedly unsavory protagonists of the film noir classic Detour.