Dunkirk edges Saving Private Ryan as the UK's favourite Second World War film

South Wales Guardian

10-05-2025

The 2017 movie also pipped films such as The Dam Busters (1955), Pearl Harbour (2001) and Bridge On The River Kwai (1957) in the poll by Deltapoll for the War Movie Theatre podcast, which covers both old and new war films.
The Christopher Nolan-directed film starring singer Harry Styles, Cillian Murphy and Barry Keoghan depicts the Dunkirk evacuation which took place in 1940 and saw more than 330,000 allied soldiers evacuated from the French harbour.
Saving Private Ryan (1998), which is directed by Steven Spielberg and follows the search for the titular character during the Normandy invasion, came second in the poll, followed by 1963's The Great Escape, which sees a group of allied prisoners attempt to escape a Nazi camp, in third.
The Dam Busters, which depicts the true story of the RAF's Operation Chastise, finished fourth in the poll, while the Battle Of Britain (1969), which is a dramatisation of the battle between the RAF and the German Luftwaffe, came in fifth.
The rest of the top 10 was made up of The Longest Day (1962), A Bridge Too Far (1977), Pearl Harbour, Schindler's List (1993), and The Bridge On The River Kwai.
Journalist and author Robert Hutton, co-host of the War Movie Theatre podcast, said of the poll: 'Cinema has always been looking for great stories, and war provides everything, heroism, moral conflict, adventure, romance.
'Even as the Second World War was being fought, it was inspiring some of the greatest films of the last century, such as In Which We Serve or Went The Day Well?, which deliver moments of human drama and comedy as well as action.
'Afterwards, it became a way for us to tell ourselves stories about what had happened, and then a generation later, with Saving Private Ryan, it became a way to commemorate.
'It's not surprising that Dunkirk is top of the list, it's the most successful war movie of the last decade. But it's noteworthy that half the list is from the golden era of war movies in the 50s and 60s. Four of them were made within eight years of each other.
'I'm a little sad that John Mills, who seemed to be permanently in uniform on Sunday afternoon TV in my childhood, doesn't get a film in this list.
'And I'd have liked to see at least one of the great Alistair MacLean commando movies, Where Eagles Dare or The Guns Of Navarone, in there. But mainly I'm appalled to see Pearl Harbour on the list, which ought to be a war crime.'
It comes after Europe commemorated the 80th anniversary of Victory In Europe (VE) Day on Thursday, May 8, which marks the end of the Second World War on the continent in 1945.
War Movie Theatre is a podcast hosted by Hutton and fellow journalist Duncan Weldon and is available from Acast and a number of other streaming platforms.
The UK's top 10 war films according to the War Movie Theatre podcast poll
1. Dunkirk (2017)
2. Saving Private Ryan (1998)
3. The Great Escape (1963)
4. The Dam Busters (1955)
5. Battle Of Britain (1969)
6. The Longest Day (1962)
7. A Bridge Too Far (1977)
8. Pearl Harbour (2001)
9. Schindler's List (1993)
10. The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)