Chess Story

The Balloon Goes Up

December 1942 •English

Balloon unit WAAFs catch German spies.

Právom lásky

January 1984 •Slovak

Bella Ciao! - German Soldiers in the Italian Resistance

June 2025 •German

When Italy capitulated 1943 and joined the allied forces, some soldiers from the German Wehrmacht also changed sides and joined the Italians in their fight to liberate the country. This film tells the story of Rudolf Jacobs, Walter Fischer and Heinz Brauers, three of the ‘Good Germans’ remembered in Italy for their efforts in fighting the Nazis.

Bampton Shows the Way

January 1941 •English

Part of BFI boxset Ration Books and Rabbit Pies: Films from the Home Front.

A Trap for the General

November 1971 •

Immediately after the war, OZNA insert an outstanding intelligence agent to catch the General Draza Mihajlovic.

The Hiding Place

August 2023 •English

World War II. Darkness has fallen over Europe, and the boots of the Third Reich echo through the streets. But on a quiet city corner in the Netherlands, some choose to resist. Corrie Ten Boom and her family risk everything to hide Jewish refugees by the hundreds, and they ultimately face the consequences when they are discovered.

Gunpowder

March 1985 •Russian

At the end of September 1941, Soviet artillery troops in besieged Leningrad realize that pretty soon they will fire their last shot, and after that the defense of the city will be doomed. The film is based on a true event: a small group of fearless soldiers transported a large supply of gunpowder through enemy lines to Leningrad.

The Fjällbacka Murders - The Hidden Child

June 2013 •Swedish

Erica's parents are killed in a traffic accident. She moves to Fjällbacka and discovers she has a brother.

Charlie & Carl

September 2011 •German

Two men and their charming friendship.

Under the Blood-Red Sun

September 2014 •English

December 7, 1941 - TOMIKAZU “TOMI” NAKAJI (Kyler Ki Sakamoto) and his best friend BILLY DAVIS (Kalama Epstein) are playing baseball in a field near their homes in Hawaii when Japan launches a surprise attack on the US at Pearl Harbor. As Tomi looks up at the sky and recognizes the Blood-Red Sun emblem on the fighter planes, he knows that his life has changed forever. Based on actual events, Under the Blood-Red Sun is an unforgettable story of friendship, courage and survival.

For the King and Fatherland

March 2015 •Serbian

The film is picturing the faith of the old Serbian warrior Milisav Janjic, who fought against the German occupation in the Second World War as a member of the "Ravnogorski pokret". The storyline narrates his memories of the past and the war events in the spring of 1941 interwoven with the contemporary moments, the author features the attack of fascist Germany, the April war and the fall of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, the misfortune placed upon the Serbian people, loss of freedom, birth of the freedom movement in Serbia and one Serbian soldier, who after 70 years of expatriation in America returns to his homeland.

Day of Independence

September 2003 •English

Zip, a 17 year-old Nisei (second-generation Japanese American) baseball pitcher, faces the tragic circumstances of the World War II internment of 110,000 Americans of Japanese ancestry. Set in a relocation camp in the summer of 1943, this film chronicles the journey of an American family torn apart by a forced and unjust incarceration, a father's decision that challenges his son to find strength, and ultimately his son's triumph through courage, sacrifice and the All-American game of baseball.

Liberation: The Break Through

May 1969 •Russian

A grandiose military film epic, which does not know analogues in world cinema: the history of the Great Patriotic War from the Battle of the Kursk Bulge to the installation of the Banner of Victory over the Reichstag - "Liberation".

Battle Over Britain

December 2023 •English

A young pilot, fresh out of training, is called to join a Flight while they wait for the call to scramble. Throughout a single day, he witnesses the skies of southern England filled with deadly dog fights, and after every exhausting battle the men return to their dispersal hut, only to find another of their number missing. Unwilling to surrender, the pilot and his comrades unite to take to the skies once more, determined to defend not only the airfield, but their entire country.

The Scout

July 1974 •Chinese

From Paris to the Rhine

January 1946 •English

A short documentary made for the British government illustrating the Allied war effort between the liberation of Paris and the arrival at the river Rhine. Part of a series that ran from the invasion of Italy to V-E Day.

Hollywood Spies

October 2017 •French

During the 1930s anti-Semitism was rampant not only in Germany but also in America. There was a German American Bund and pro-Nazi rallies even filled Madison Square Gardens in New York City. And the US was isolationist. Until Pearl Harbor, then, everything changed. Spymasters throughout the 20th century, and particularly during times of conflict, thought it advantageous to enlist the services of celebrities who had high level and powerful "fans" in various industries, many with easy access to politicians and high ranking government officials. Hollywood, as we now know from declassified National Archive documents, aided in the mobilization for war and its people contributed as spies, combatants, propagandists, documentary and fund-raisers, entertainers, and morale-boosters. Hundreds of celebrities eagerly answered the "call to arms" and brought their talents and patriotism to the intelligence services, military and war information offices.

Woman from the Killed Village

December 1975 •Belarusian

One of the five-part documentary series by Belarusian writer and director Viktor Dashuk, which recounts the horrors experienced by the Belarusian people during World War II, through firsthand accounts of survivors and newsreel footage.

The Coward

April 1962 •Czech

In a remote Slovak village in the closing days of World War II, a schoolteacher and his young wife find a wounded Russian parachutist in their front yard just as the Germans are coming in to occupy their village. As his wife readily becomes involved with anti-Nazi partisans, the schoolteacher collaborates with the Germans in fear.

Až do konce

December 1985 •Czech

Sudetenland, May 1945. A group of retreating German soldiers capture a group of young female workers, totally deployed in a chemical factory. He wants to use them as hostages during his advance to the American demarcation line. Together with them, they take refuge in a nearby castle, which soon becomes the site of the last battle that takes place both in the minds and in the backdrop of war-torn Czechoslovakia, shortly before liberation. A psychological probe as well as an intimate drama set within the walls of a small castle, it is a mosaic of mini-stories charting the fates, attitudes and thought processes of individual characters on both sides of the barricade.