Movies like The Architect: A Montford Point Marine (2023)

Father Soldier Son (2020)

When Sgt. First Class Brian Eisch is critically wounded in Afghanistan, it sets him and his sons on a journey of love, loss, redemption and legacy.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & war

Korengal (2014)

Korengal picks up where Restrepo left off; the same men, the same valley, the same commanders, but a very different look at the experience of war.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & war

Why We Fight: Prelude to War (1942)

Prelude to War was the first film of Frank Capra's Why We Fight propaganda film series, commissioned by the Pentagon and George C. Marshall. It was made to convince American troops of the necessity of combating the Axis Powers during World War II. This film examines the differences between democratic and fascist states.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & war

Last Days in Vietnam (2014)

During the chaotic final weeks of the Vietnam War, the North Vietnamese Army closes in on Saigon as the panicked South Vietnamese people desperately attempt to escape. On the ground, American soldiers and diplomats confront a moral quandary: whether to obey White House orders to evacuate only U.S. citizens.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both war & documentary

Five Came Back (2017)

The extraordinary story of how Hollywood changed World War II – and how World War II changed Hollywood, through the interwoven experiences of five legendary filmmakers who went to war to serve their country and bring the truth to the American people: John Ford, William Wyler, John Huston, Frank Capra, and George Stevens. Based on Mark Harris’ best-selling book, “Five Came Back: A Story of Hollywood and the Second World War.”

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & war

They Shall Not Grow Old (2018)

A documentary about World War I with never-before-seen footage to commemorate the centennial of Armistice Day, and the end of the war.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & war

2000 Meters to Andriivka (2025)

Amid the failing counteroffensive, a journalist follows a Ukrainian platoon on their mission to traverse one mile of heavily fortified forest and liberate a strategic village from Russian occupation. But the farther they advance through their destroyed homeland, the more they realize that this war may never end.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & war

Restrepo (2010)

Directors Hetherington and Junger spend a year with the 2nd Battalion of the United States Army located in one of Afghanistan's most dangerous valleys. The documentary provides insight and empathy on how to win the battle through hard work, deadly gunfights and mutual friendships while the unit must push back the Taliban.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both war & documentary

Let There Be Light (1946)

The final entry in a trilogy of films produced for the U.S. government by John Huston. Some returning combat veterans suffer scars that are more psychological than physical. This film follows patients and staff during their treatment. It deals with what would now be called PTSD, but at the time was categorised as psychoneurosis or shell-shock. Government officials deemed this 1946 film counterproductive to postwar efforts; it was not shown publicly until 1981.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & war

The Soviet Story (2008)

“The Soviet Story” is a story of an Allied power, which helped the Nazis to fight Jews and which slaughtered its own people on an industrial scale. Assisted by the West, this power triumphed on May 9th, 1945. Its crimes were made taboo, and the complete story of Europe’s most murderous regime has never been told. Until now...

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & war

The Battle of San Pietro (1945)

This documentary movie is about the battle of San Pietro, a small village in Italy. Over 1,100 US soldiers were killed while trying to take this location, that blocked the way for the Allied forces from the Germans. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in 2005.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both war & documentary

The Age of Stupid (2009)

Pete Postlethwaite stars as a man living alone in the devastated future world of 2055, looking at old footage from 2008 and asking: why didn’t we stop climate change when we had the chance?

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both war & documentary

The Battle of Midway (1942)

The Japanese attack on Midway in June 1942, filmed as it happened. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive, in partnership with Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation, in 2006.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & war

For Sama (2019)

A love letter from a young mother to her daughter, the film tells the story of Waad al-Kateab’s life through five years of the uprising in Aleppo, Syria as she falls in love, gets married and gives birth to Sama, all while cataclysmic conflict rises around her. Her camera captures incredible stories of loss, laughter and survival as Waad wrestles with an impossible choice– whether or not to flee the city to protect her daughter’s life, when leaving means abandoning the struggle for freedom for which she has already sacrificed so much.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & war

Virunga (2014)

Virunga in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is Africa's oldest national park, a UNESCO world heritage site, and a contested ground among insurgencies seeking to topple the government that see untold profits in the land. Among this ongoing power struggle, Virunga also happens to be the last natural habitat for the critically endangered mountain gorilla. The only thing standing in the way of the forces closing in around the gorillas: a handful of passionate park rangers and journalists fighting to secure the park's borders and expose the corruption of its enemies. Filled with shocking footage, and anchored by the surprisingly deep and gentle characters of the gorillas themselves, Virunga is a galvanizing call to action around an ongoing political and environmental crisis in the Congo.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & war

Salinger (2013)

An in-depth investigation into the private world of the American writer J. D. Salinger (1919-2010), who lived most of his life behind the impenetrable wall of a self-imposed seclusion: how his dramatic experiences during World War II influenced his life and work, his relationships with very young women, his obsessive writing methods, his many literary secrets.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

Night Will Fall (2014)

When Allied forces liberated the Nazi concentration camps in 1944-45, their terrible discoveries were recorded by army and newsreel cameramen, revealing for the first time the full horror of what had happened. Making use of British, Soviet and American footage, the Ministry of Information’s Sidney Bernstein (later founder of Granada Television) aimed to create a documentary that would provide lasting, undeniable evidence of the Nazis’ unspeakable crimes. He commissioned a wealth of British talent, including editor Stewart McAllister, writer and future cabinet minister Richard Crossman – and, as treatment advisor, his friend Alfred Hitchcock. Yet, despite initial support from the British and US Governments, the film was shelved, and only now, 70 years on, has it been restored and completed by Imperial War Museums under its original title "German Concentration Camps Factual Survey".

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

Bruce Lee, the Legend (1984)

The Official Golden Harvest tribute to the Master of the Martial Arts Film, Bruce Lee.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

Sidney (2022)

This revealing documentary honors the legendary Sidney Poitier—iconic actor, filmmaker, and civil rights activist. Featuring interviews with Denzel Washington, Spike Lee, Halle Berry, and more.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

The Fog of War (2003)

Former corporate whiz kid Robert McNamara was the controversial Secretary of Defense in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations, during the height of the Vietnam War. Augmented by archival footage and cabinet conversation recordings, Errol Morris gives the conflicted McNamara a platform on which he attempts to confront his and the U.S. government's actions in Southeast Asia in light of the horrors of modern warfare, the end of ideology and the punitive judgment of history.

Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary

Purple Stain (2026)

The film follows an architecture graduate as she reflects on the meaning of home and the labor of making home. Architecture is framed beyond the physical built object: as a second skin that stretches and reconfigures itself as she, too, stretches to be in a new place. The film moves through themes of migration, womanhood, and what it means to be an architect without building, still making architecture constantly, just through different forms.

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

Red Scarf (1964)

South Korean Air Force pilots engage in perilous missions against Communist North Koreans during the Korean War.

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both war

Edwin Lutyens Master Architect (1981)

Architecture critic Patrick Nuttgens narrates a documentary on the 20th century architect Edwin Lutyns, exploring the plans and buildings of the man who designed Liverpool Metropolitan Cathederal and the city of New Delhi.

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

Battleship Berlin (2021)

Berlin’s brutalist heritage is under fire. The city’s powerful Charité hospital wants to destroy a brutalist icon of the Cold War era: The infamous former animal research laboratory called the Mäusebunker. Meanwhile, a dedicated group of politicians, preservationists, architects, gallerists, and students fight for an adaptive reuse of these magnificent, uncompromisingly unique structures. Who will win? No matter the outcome, you’re left with the impression that preservation can be brutal.

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

Wildflowers on the Battleground (1974)

A look at the Korean War through the eyes of a mute boy who was kept as a mascot by a regiment of soldiers near the front lines.

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both war

Slums: Cities of Tomorrow (2014)

One billion people on our planet—one in six—live in shantytowns, slums or squats. Slums: Cities of Tomorrow challenges conventional thinking to propose that slums are in fact the solution, not the problem, to urban overcrowding caused by the massive migration of people to cities. (Lynne Fernie, HotDocs)

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

Kamenná sláva (1938)

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

Welcome to Dongmakgol (2005)

Based on the long running play by Jang Jin, the story is set in Korea during the Korean War in 1950. Soldiers from both the North and South, as well as an American pilot, find themselves in a secluded and naively idealistic village, its residents unaware of the outside world, including the war.

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both war

Kisho Kurokawa From Metabolism to Symbiosis (1993)

A portrait of the internationally acclaimed Japanese architect who employs Buddhist ideas and western modernism to achieve intercultural architecture.

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary

Zaha Hadid... Who Dares Wins (2013)

Alan Yentob profiles the most successful female architect there has ever been, the late Zaha Hadid, who designed buildings around the globe from Austria to Azerbaijan.

Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary