War films are about so much more than the battle front: they can enrich our understanding of the home setting, combat tactics and military strategy, camp life, training and political agendas. The purpose of the war film made by commercial enterprises is primarily to entertain, and yet films about wartime as propaganda are a valuable genre to study, as are biographies of important historical figures. This is but a small selection of the many films available from the ANU Library branches.
Twelve-year-old Adama lives in a remote West African village. Defying the village elders, Adama decides to set off in search of him. With the steadfast determination of a child coming of age, he embarks on a quest that takes him over the seas, to the North, to the frontline of the First World War.
To escape the civil war in Sri Lanka, a former soldier, a young woman and a little girl pose as a family. They end up settling in a housing project outside Paris, and try to rebuild their lives together.
In the form of a love letter from a young mother to her daughter, Sama, the film tells the story of Waad al-Kateab's life through five years of the uprising in Aleppo, Syria.
Follows young Chris Taylor who arrives in Vietnam and quickly discovers that his worst enemies are not just the Viet Cong, but gnawing fear, physical exhaustion, and the anger growing within himself
Sgt. Stryker, a hard-nosed Marine sergeant, must mold a company of raw recruits into a combat-ready fighting machine. Feared by many and hated by all, Stryker's training is soon put to the test in a full-scale assault against the Japanese on Iwo Jima.
This film centres on the 1942-43 Henan Famine, which occurred during the Second Sino-Japanese War, and depicts not only Japanese atrocities, but also the perceived aloofness and malicious corruption of the Nationalist leadership ruling China at the time.
