There are some great anti-war movies. They offer far different perspectives on war than the “glamorous” and “heroic” portrayals often presented in textbooks and in the mass media.

The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation recommends the movies listed below. Most are available in video stores and can be purchased over the web. They are great movies to watch and to share, and they offer a starting point for reflection and discussion of the true face of war and the importance of peace.

A Time to Love and A Time to Die (1958) is the story of a young Nazi soldier who falls in love while on leave during the height of the Second World War. Before his son is born, he is ordered to return to the Russian front to participate in a deadly campaign.

All Quiet on the Western Front (1930) is an anti-war classic, based on the Novel by Erich Maria Remarque, that portrays the First World War from a German perspective. Young German soldiers eagerly join the German ranks with misguided and romantic notions about war. On the battlefield, they realize what war really means.

Amazing Grace and Chuck (1987) is a thoughtful story of a young little league pitcher from Montana who stages a protest against nuclear weapons by refusing to play baseball until every nuclear weapon is dismantled. His protest inspires professional athletes and soon a movement evolves that eventually draws the attention of the US President. Ultimately this is a film that demonstrates the power of the individual to create change.

Breaker Morant (1980) is based on a true courtroom drama of three Australian soldiers in the Boer War who are served up as political scapegoats of the British Empire.

Catch 22 (1970), directed by Mike Nichols (The Graduate), is an all-star rendition of Joseph Heller’s famous World War II novel. The cast includes Orson Welles, Jon Voight, Bob Newhart, Anthony Perkins, Richard Benjamin, and Martin Sheen.

Cold Mountain (2003) starring Nicole Kidman and Jude Law, takes place in the 1860s during the Civil War in the United States. At the outset of the war the young men are eager to fight, not realizing the murderous reality of what they will soon be facing. The viewer learns again that war is far from glorious.

Dr. Strangelove (1964) is the definitive satire of the nuclear age, directed by Stanley Kubrick. It is the story of Colonel Jack Ripper who, without consulting the President, sends a squadron of bombers to the Soviet Union and provokes the Doomsday Device.

Gandhi (1982) is a three-hour, multiple-Oscar winning look at the life of Mohandas K. Gandhi (Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Actor).

Grand Illusion (1937) is the film the Nazis declared “Cinematographic Enemy Number One.” It is a film set during World War I where two French prisoners of war plot their escape from their German POW camp.

Johnny Got His Gun (1971) is the story of Joe who returns from World War I alive, but without his eyes, his mouth, his ears, his arms and without his legs. The film begs its audience to identify with Joe who is unable to taste his food, unable to hear the nurse, unable to speak with the doctor and unable to move from his hospital bed.

King of Hearts (1967) is set in 1918, in a small French town that has been evacuated and deserted, except for the population from the local insane asylum that has escaped. A lone Scottish soldier is sent to the town on an intelligence tip that claims a German bomb has been planted that would level the region. The Scottish soldier meets many of the escapees and decides to stay with them despite the risk of the German bomb. Why? He wonders which place is most insane, the small French town inundated with escapees or the rest of Europe where millions are fighting and dying in a worthless war.

Paths of Glory (1957), directed by Stanley Kubrick is a story where Colonel Dax (Kirk Douglas) is ordered to make an impossible assault on a German fortification. When the assault fails the commanding general demands three soldiers be arbitrarily chosen to face trial for cowardice.

Red Badge of Courage (1951) is a film adaptation of the 1895 novel by Stephen Crane about a young man’s first experience as a soldier in the American Civil War. All illusions of heroism are lost during his first skirmish and he must come to terms with the realities of warfare.

Romero (1989) is the life story of Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador. Oscar Romero fought for the voiceless, demanding justice and dignity for the people stuck between the warring communists and the counterinsurgents waging a dirty war in El Salvador.

Slaughterhouse Five or the Children’s Crusade (1972) is the story of Billy Pilgrim, a miserable US soldier during the Second World War, who is taken prisoner by the Germans. Along with just a few others, Billy survives the terrifying bombing of Dresden. The haphazard perspective, where Billy becomes unstuck in time, gives the audience a window into the mind of a soldier whose psyche has been destroyed by war.

The Diary of Anne Frank (1959) is a film adaptation of the play based on the writings of Anne Frank. It is a revealing story of a Jewish girl hiding with her family from the Nazi occupation in the attic of an Amsterdam building.

The Great Dictator (1940) is a slapstick creation where Charlie Chaplin (Director and Star) plays Adenoid Hynkel, the fascist ruler of Tomania with global ambitions, and a meek Jewish barber toiling under fascist rule. Both characters deliver moving performances.

Wag the Dog (1997) is the story of the US president wrapped up in scandal and the people working hard to camouflage the facts. The all-star cast includes Dustin Hoffman, Robert De Niro, Willie Nelson, Anne Heche and Woody Harrelson. The movie examines the life of a Washington spinmaster who distracts the public from the scandal by waging a phony war overseas.

War and Peace (1956) stars Audrey Hepburn and Henry Fonda and adapts Leo Tolstoy’s classic to the screen. This is the story of the Napoleonic invasion of Russia in 1812.

The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation recommends the books listed below for their portrayal of the painful reality of war that is often lost in the nationalistic fog that surrounds the fighting and often mirror-image illusions of glory and dreams of victory.

A Farewell to Arms (1929) by Ernest Hemingway has been called the best American novel to emerge from the First World War. It tells the story of Lieutenant Henry, a US ambulance driver who is wounded on duty and of Catherine Barkley, the British nurse who oversees Henry’s care. Hemingway’s detailed and emotional descriptions of the battlefield originate from his own experience on the front as an ambulance driver in the First World War.

A Time to Love and a Time to Die (1954) by Erich Maria Remarque is the story of Ernst Graeber, a German soldier on furlough from two years at the Russian front. During his three weeks leave he returns to his hometown, which has been bombed into ruin. Nobody knows if his parents are dead or alive. Before returning to the Russian front, Ernst falls in love. The German edition was censored at the time of its release for its subversive passages.

All Quiet on the Western Front (1929) by Erich Maria Remarque is the story of idealistic German boys who eagerly enlist in the German army during the First World War. The terrible realities of the battlefield are realistically detailed because Remarque himself fought on the Western front during the war.

Hiroshima (1946) was written right after author and journalist, John Hersey, interviewed survivors of the atomic bombing in Hiroshima. It is especially moving because Hersey details the individual survivors; we learn their names and their stories. For example, John Hersey describes the life of Miss Toshiko Sasaki before she was a victim of the atomic attack, and describes in brutal detail the affects of the bomb on her life, body, and mind.

Johnny Got His Gun (1939) by Dalton Trumbo is the story of Joe, a soldier who returns from war, literally torn to pieces. All that remains of Joe’s body are his torso and part of his head; he has no arms, legs, eyes, nose, mouth or tongue. But he can still think.

Night (1995) by Eli Weisel was initially a 900-page memoir, And the World Kept Silent, of his experiences as a young boy in Nazi concentration camps during the Second World War. Significantly reduced, Night is Weisel’s terrifying account of life and death in Nazi camps.

On the Beach (1957) by Nevil Shute is a story about the end of the world. A full-scale nuclear war has taken place in the Northern hemisphere and the Earth is slowly falling under the shadow of a radioactive cloud. On the Beach focuses on Australia’s inhabitants as they come to terms with the end of the world.

Red Badge of Courage (1895) by Stephen Crane is the classic story of Henry Fleming’s rite of passage in the United States Civil War. Fleming is a young man who imagines war to be a glorious thing. At his first engagement on the battlefield Fleming is terrorized and flees the conflict, his notions of glory and prestige vanished.

Slaughterhouse Five or the Children’s Crusade (1969) by Kurt Vonnegut is the story of Billy Pilgrim, a veteran of the Second World War. The horrors Billy witnessed during the war have altered his consciousness. He slips in and out of reality, Vonnegut calls it “becoming unstuck in time.” Pilgrim dwells on his experiences in Dresden, where he and other prisoners of war were the sole survivors of the allied firebombing that killed tens of thousands of people.

The Diary of Anne Frank (1947) by Anne Frank is the story of a young Jewish girl and her family who hide in an Amsterdam attic to avoid Nazi persecution and extermination. It is a detailed account of 25 months in hiding where readers can immerse themselves in the life of a girl and her family who faced arbitrary cruelty.

War and Peace (1869) by Leo Tolstoy takes place during Russia’s struggle against Napoleonic Europe, climaxing during the War of 1812. This story of life shrouded in war revolves around the Bezuhov, the Rostov and the Bolkonsky families, three very affluent Russian families.