San Lorenzo's Night is the night when dreams come true in Italian folklore. It is also a night when an older woman recalls 1944, when she was six-years-old and the stars were shell bursts and a group of peasants fled the Germans and Fascists through the Tuscan countryside to American lines. 'La Notte Di San Lorenzo' is a stunning film, a mesmerising portrayal of love, loss, betrayal and hope. find out more...

Lacombe is a young French peasant who wants to join the resistance but is considered too young, so instead he joins the Gestapo! He enjoys his power but soon falls in love with a Jewish girl. This can be seen as Malle's answer to the question who colloborates? The film maps the mechanics of compromise with precision and without histronics. Another superb film from the great French director. find out more...

An acclaimed and gloriously visual epic that follows the life of Avik, a young half-Eskimo boy, in his search for love and identity. It takes him across continents, through the hell of war, and into a painful reunion with Aubertine, his childhood sweet-heart. Moving, beautiful and superbly filmed. find out more...

A delightful and highly acclaimed drama that tenderly depicts the plight of a small group of Italian soldiers marooned on an idyllic and isolated Greek Island during WW2. They all become entranced by its beauty and people, as the War rolls on without them. Superbly filmed, lighthearted and romantic. find out more...

After two years in an asylum Stephen Neale is released into the insanity that is WWII England, where he stumbles across a murderous spy ring and doesn't know whom he can trust. An atmospheric, expressionistic, war time thriller, packed with unforgettable scenes, starring Ray Milland and directed by the wilfully left-field genius that is Fritz Lang. find out more...

Guillermo Del Toro's blockbusting tale of a young girl struggling to make sense of the violent world around her was a big 2006 arthouse hit. Continuing his exploration of the impact of the Spanish Civil War on his generation (it was also the backdrop for his excellent ghost story, The Devil's Backbone) Del Toro's fantasy mixes strong horror with fairytale-style aesthetics to great effect, making Ofelia's escape into an imaginary realm a poignant response to the cruel realities of her existence. find out more...

David Hare's brilliant screenplay is both a comment on the desperate results of a casual sexual encounter, the passion of a moment snatched in war-time France - the intensity of which can never be matched again, and a commentary on the post war decline of Britian. A brilliant movie! find out more...

Set in the Sino-Japanese war, Yasuzo Masumura's black-and-white anti-war film tells of an army nurse who sexually services an amputee and falls in love with a drug-addicted surgeon. This can't be recommended to the squeamish, but neither can its nuanced eroticism nor its passionate, unpredictable moral focus, be easily shaken off. Comparable with Altman's MASH, it suggests a less comic treatment of the same theme, how to preserve one's humanity in impossible circumstances, but its ethics are con find out more...

The film version of Kurt Vonnegut Jr's famous anti-war sci-fi novel. Slipping back and forth along his own life line a suburban optometrist experiences the fire bombing of Dresden and captivity on the planet Trafalmardore. A powerful and seemingly unfilmable book that turned out to be a great movie. find out more...

Set during WW2; Veronica is madly in love with her fiancé, Boris, who departs for the front to do his patriotic duty. The story unravels to depict a poignant portrayal of blameless individuals doing their best to survive the travails of tragedy and hardship in the face of such an all consuming conflict. The compelling narrative is complemented by stunning black and white cinematography and the film deservedly won the Cannes Palme d'Or in 1958, reintroducing Soviet cinema to the Western world. find out more...