Best movies like Shanghai 1937: Where World War II Began

This amazing biblical drama chronicles the brave and historic legend of Hadassah, a Jewish orphan with exceptional beauty who rises to become Queen Esther of Persia and saves Persian Jews from genocide. By revealing her heritage to the king, Esther thwarts the evil prime minister's plan to annihilate all Jews in the Persian Empire. The annual festival of Purim is inspired by her heroism.

A luxury cruise boat motors up the Yangtze - navigating the mythic waterway known in China simply as "The River." The Yangtze is about to be transformed by the biggest hydroelectric dam in history. At the river's edge - a young woman says goodbye to her family as the floodwaters rise towards their small homestead. The Three Gorges Dam - contested symbol of the Chinese economic miracle - provides the epic backdrop for Up the Yangtze, a dramatic feature documentary on life inside modern China.

World War II vet Paul Sutton falls for a pregnant and unwed woman who persuades him -- during their first encounter -- to pose as her husband so she can face her family.

This claymation short film uses a real interview for dialogue. Bill Perry relates stories about his youth, his tilted house, and adventures during WWII in Bristol, England during the blitz.

American businessmen and missionaries working in China are captured and held prisoner by a local warlord.

The story of the rape of Nanking, one of the most tragic events in history. In 1937, the invading Japanese army murdered over 200,000 and raped tens of thousands of Chinese. In the midst of this horror, a small group of Western expatriates banded together to save 250,000. Nanking shows the tremendous impact individuals can make on the course of history.

The true story of airman Douglas Bader who overcame the loss of both legs in a 1931 flying accident to become a successful fighter pilot and wing leader during World War II.

In 208 A.D., in the final days of the Han Dynasty, shrewd Prime Minster Cao convinced the fickle Emperor Han the only way to unite all of China was to declare war on the kingdoms of Xu in the west and East Wu in the south. Thus began a military campaign of unprecedented scale. Left with no other hope for survival, the kingdoms of Xu and East Wu formed an unlikely alliance.

A satirical alternative history of World War II where the Nazis seize London and England must band together to prevent a full on invasion.

The dramatic story of US marines in training, in combat and in love during World War II. The story centres on a major who guides the raw recruits from their training to combat. Based on the novel by Leon Uris.

Eugene, an aspiring writer from Brooklyn, is drafted into the US Army during the final months of World War II. For his basic training, the Army sends him to Camp Shelby in Mississippi, where toil, bad food, and antisemitic jibes await. Eugene takes refuge in his sense of humor and in his diary, but they won't protect him in a battle of wills with an unstable drill sergeant.

An American missionary is gradually seduced by a courtly warlord holding her in Shanghai.

In the aftermath of World War II, a British colonel and his wife are assigned to live in Hamburg during the post-war reconstruction, but tensions arise with the German widower who lives with them.

A pig farmer, a busboy, a salon owner, an expat architect and a jaded rich girl cross paths as thousands of dead pigs float down the Yangtze River toward Shanghai.

Jamie Graham, a privileged English boy, is living in Shanghai when the Japanese invade and force all foreigners into prison camps. Jamie is captured with an American sailor, who looks out for him while they are in the camp together. Even though he is separated from his parents and in a hostile environment, Jamie maintains his dignity and youthful spirit, providing a beacon of hope for the others held captive with him.

With the Third Reich at its peak in 1942, the Czech resistance in London plans the most ambitious military operation of WWII – Anthropoid. Two young recruits are sent to Prague to assassinate the most ruthless Nazi leader – Reinhardt Heydrich, head of the SS, the Gestapo and the architect of the Final Solution.

In the last months of World War II, as the Allies make their final push in the European theatre, a battle-hardened U.S. Army sergeant named 'Wardaddy' commands a Sherman tank called 'Fury' and its five-man crew on a deadly mission behind enemy lines. Outnumbered and outgunned, Wardaddy and his men face overwhelming odds in their heroic attempts to strike at the heart of Nazi Germany.

A Russian and a German sniper play a game of cat-and-mouse during the Battle of Stalingrad in WWII.

The true WWII story of Audie Murphy, the most decorated soldier in U.S. history. Based on the autobiography of Audie Murphy who stars as himself in the film.

During the 1940s, Maurice Bendrix, a writer recently discharged from the armed service, falls in love with Sarah Miles, whom he interviews for a book. Sarah is married, but she and Maurice eventually give in to their mutual attraction, leading to an affair that lasts several months. Maurice's jealousy, along with the bombing of London by the Germans, seemingly leads to the end of their relationship. However, the reasons are later revealed to be more complex.

Peter Gabriel is among the rockstars performing the music of Lennon and McCartney against a montage of World War II newsreel footage.

MANUFACTURED LANDSCAPES is the striking new documentary on the world and work of renowned artist Edward Burtynsky. Internationally acclaimed for his large-scale photographs of “manufactured landscapes”—quarries, recycling yards, factories, mines and dams—Burtynsky creates stunningly beautiful art from civilization’s materials and debris.

Wartime tale of a group of British scientists efforts to develop the first radar system. They did it just in time for it to be used in the Battle of Britain against the might of the Nazi Luftwaffe. Without it the little island could well have been overrun.

The WWII pivotal battle of Stalingrad is shown through the eyes of the soldiers and officers on both sides of the war.

Re-enactment of World War 2 Battle of Arnhem using the survivors from the battle.

A child escapes from Poland during World War II and first heads to Greece before coming of age in Canada.

In 1930s Shanghai, 'The White Countess' is both Sofia—a fallen member of the Russian aristocracy—and a nightclub created by a blind American diplomat, who asks Sofia to be the centerpiece of the world he wants to create.

A truck convoy traveling the Burma Road is menaced by a group of smugglers.

An American man returns to a corrupt, Japanese-occupied Shanghai four months before Pearl Harbor and discovers his friend has been killed. While he unravels the mysteries of the death, he falls in love and discovers a much larger secret that his own government is hiding.

With suicide rates among active military servicemen and veterans currently on the rise, this documentary brings urgent attention to the invisible wounds of war. Drawing on personal stories of American soldiers whose lives and psyches were torn asunder by the horrors of battle and PTSD, the documentary chronicles the lingering effects of combat stress and post-traumatic stress on military personnel and their families throughout American history, from the Civil War through today's conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

During World War II, a hand-picked group of American GI's undertook a bizarre mission: create a traveling road show of deception on the battlefields of Europe, with the German Army as their audience. The 23rd Headquarters Special Troops used inflatable rubber tanks, sound trucks, and dazzling performance art to bluff the enemy again and again, often right along the front lines. Many of the men picked to carry out these dangerous deception missions were artists. Some went on to become famous, including fashion designer Bill Blass. In their spare time, they painted and sketched their way across Europe, creating a unique and moving visual record of their war. Their secret mission was kept hushed up for nearly 50 years after the war's end.

A murder occurs on a train bound for Shanghai during World War II.

During the last desperate months of World War II, an Allied mission to regain Ramree Island off the coast of Burma ends in horror when an embattled group of soldiers find themselves trapped in dense swampland infested with deadly saltwater crocodiles. As the men are picked off one by one by the hungry reptiles, those that remain resort to increasingly desperate measures to survive the onslaught of carnage and get off the island alive.

A female doctor struggling to find her daughter after a long lost World War II biological weapon explodes on a U.S. military base in Bulgaria, turning people into mutant zombies.

First American film about the conflict between Jewish nationalists and the British in the creation of the state of Israel.

Americans Tommy Baldwin and Joe Dugan are hired to transport a fabulous diamond from Shanghai to San Francisco. They will be paid handsomely on success or killed on failure. The diamond is stolen as they take possession of it.

In May 1940, feeling the RAF needs every man to fight to Luftwaffe, Geoffrey 'Geoff'/'Boy' Wellum joins at 18, becoming the youngest ever Spitfire pilot. After an intense training, he soon bonds with the flying men of his squadron. In the air, danger is great, but on the ground drinks, sports and girls, in Geoff's case Sarah, provide great comfort. However in time, the casualties exact a grueling psychological toll, until his tour of duty is ended after 18 months.

Another of a wartime cycle of Hollywood films lauding the praises of America's Soviet allies, Three Russian Girls is a remake of Russia's The Girl From Stalingrad. Set just after the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, the film stars Anna Sten as Natasha, a Red Cross volunteer who is dispatched to a field hospital located in an old pre-revolution mansion. American test pilot John Hill (Kent Smith), who'd been in Russia on a goodwill mission, is wounded in battle and brought to the hospital. As he slowly recovers from his wounds, Hill falls in love with Natasha. A last-act crisis develops when the hospital personnel are forced to move immediately to Leningrad as the Nazis advance.

The documentary recounts the world's first nuclear attack and examines the alarming repercussions. Covering a three-week period from the Trinity test to the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, the program chronicles America's political gamble and the planning for the momentous event. Archival film, dramatizations, and special effects feature what occurred aboard the Enola Gay (the aircraft that dropped the bomb) and inside the exploding bomb.

How, in 1945, after the end of World War II and the fall of the Nazi regime, the defeated were atrociously mistreated, especially those ethnic Germans who had lived peacefully for centuries in Germany's neighboring countries, such as Czechoslovakia and Poland. A heartbreaking story of revenge against innocent civilians, the story of acts as cruel as the Nazi occupation during the war years.

Five years after the war in the Falklands between Britain and Argentina, many facts were still wrapped in red tape. Many of the key figures had remained silent. No-one had been to Argentina to tell the other side of the story. For the majority of the British people, the war was another glorious chapter in their history. With flags waving and bands playing, British troops had sailed away to repel the invaders. Patriotic emotions were stirred as they returned victorious. Government MPs tried to get the film banned, but Yorkshire TV's telephones were jammed with messages of support from wives and mothers of those who died in the conflict. Called 'the documentary to end all documentaries about the Falklands War' in the British press, it was also described as 'more poem than polemic - a hymn against war'.

Seventy years on, brothers Colin and Ewan McGregor take viewers through the key moments of the Battle of Britain, when 'the few' of the RAF faced the might of the Nazi Luftwaffe. As they fly historic planes, meet the veterans, explore the tactics and technology, Colin and Ewan discover the importance of the Battle and the surviving legacy of the 1940's campaign for the modern RAF.

Winston Churchill, one of the most revered men of the twentieth century. Adolf Hitler, one of the most hated leaders in contemporary history. Between 1940 and 1945, these two enormously contradictory personalities faced each other in both politics and war. A clash of giants whose story begins in the trenches of the World War I and ends with the debacle of the World War II.

To mark the 70th anniversary of the Dunkirk evacuation, Dan Snow tells the story of the 'little ships' which made the perilous cross-channel voyage, as 50 of them return to France.

How the Soviet Union was able to copy the Boeing B-29 Superfortress bomber, and the influence of the resulting Tupolev TU-4 on the Cold War.

World War II provides the setting for a melodramatic tale of love and revenge.

A pilot carrying a valuable amulet is shot down over China by a ruthless Russian agent, who also wants the amulet.

Lt. Robert Cappa and his platoon of 2nd Infantry Division soldiers must defend a vital supply depot from being captured by attacking German soldiers.

During the brutal invasion of China in 1937 by Imperial Japanese forces, tens of thousands of civilians and prisoners of war are murdered and women raped in what is known simply as "The Rape of Nanking." This docudrama is a stirring account of a small band of courageous American missionaries who choose to stay in Nanking to try and protect a quarter million vulnerable Chinese civilians who are trapped in a city ruled by a savage, out of control army. Their stories are brought vividly to life through actual real-time letters and diaries as they bear witness to one of the worst wartime atrocities in history.

In 1940, Winston Churchill and Ian Fleming form a clandestine combat organization for Britain's military that changes the course of World War II and prefigures the modern black ops unit through its unconventional and entirely ‘ungentlemanly’ fighting techniques against the Nazis.