Movies like The Unknown Soldier (1955)
The best movies like The Unknown Soldier (1955) are Unknown Soldier (2017), Ambush (1999) and The Unknown Soldier (1985). If The Unknown Soldier hooked you with its drama and war, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedCome and See (1985)8.2/10 from 2,022 votes
- NewestKalashnikov AK-47 (2020)Released 2020
Unknown Soldier (2017)
The film follows Finnish army machine gun company in Continuation War against Soviet Union, 1941–1944. Based on Väinö Linna's best selling novel Tuntematon Sotilas (The Unknown Soldier) and the novel's uncensored version, Sotaromaani (A War Novel).
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both war & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAmbush (1999)
It is the summer of 1941 and the Finnish army has been mobilized along the border with Russia. A platoon led by Lt. Eero Perkola is waiting for orders to go on the offensive. The platoon receives orders for a recon mission through the wilderness around the Lieksa lake to search for possible Russian defensive positions.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Unknown Soldier (1985)
Second silver screen adaption of the Finnish war book by Väinö Linna. The story is based on Linna's experiences as an infantry man in the Finnish army during the so called "Continuation War" (1941-1944).
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Winter War (1989)
After Nazi Germany invades Poland in September 1939, Russia attacks Finland two months later. Finnish reservists leave home and go to war. Brothers Martti and Paavo Hakala, farmers from the municipality of Kauhava in the province of Pohjanmaa/Ostrobothnia, serve in a Finnish platoon.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like this1944 The Final Defence (2007)
The Soviet army breaks through the Finnish defences on the Karelian Isthmus in June 1944, advancing with overwhelming force. Somehow, the Finnish troops must find the strength to fight back, with all odds against them. The Battle of Tali-Ihantala was the largest battle ever fought in the history of the Nordic countries. This film depicts the true events through five separate stories.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both war & drama
1944 (2015)
The events of the war in 1944, from the Blue Hills to Sõrve Peninsula. Shown through the eyes of Estonian soldiers who had to pick sides and fight against fellow brothers. Choices have to be made, not only by the soldiers, but also by their loved ones.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both war & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisTwenty Days Without War (1976)
War correspondent Lopatin takes a 20-day-leave from his hard work at the front in 1942. He travels to faraway Tashkent to meet the family of the killed soldier and visit the film set of the screen adaptation of his war-time stories. Lopatin also manages to walk the streets of Tashkent, take part in a factory workers' meeting and have a short-lived love affair. Although with no bombings and fighting, the city dwellers breathe the atmosphere of the ongoing war.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both war & drama
Father of a Soldier (1965)
When peasant Georgy Makharashvili hears that his soldier son is lying wounded in a hospital, he sets out to visit him. However, unknown to him, his son has been sent back to the front. Reluctant to return home and in a vain attempt to locate his boy, Georgy joins the Red Army in it's unrelenting push to the west.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Most Beautiful (1944)
Young women at a precision optics factory in wartime Japan push to exceed production quotas, enduring illness, injury, and personal hardship to “serve the country.” Led by Tsuru Watanabe, they fight fatigue and setbacks to keep their line moving—even when duty collides with grief.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
SnoozefestMovies like thisLeibstandarte: My Honor Was Loyalty (2015)
Captain Ludwig Herckel a devoted and patriotic soldier of the SS Leibstandarte fights in every major conflict from the Eastern front to the battle of the bulge. Fiercely loyal to his country and his brothers in arms, loved by his men, Herckel will face his greatest battle yet when he discovers the truth about the Nazi regime.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Battle of the Bulge (1965)
In the winter of 1944, the Allied Armies stand ready to invade Germany at the coming of a New Year. To prevent it, Hitler orders an all-out offensive to re-take French territory and capture the major port city of Antwerp.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Dawns Here Are Quiet (1972)
In a remote village in Karelia, Sergeant Vaskov commands an anti-aircraft unit that protects a rail depot. While his men are transferred to the front line, he is reprimanded for their unruly behavior. He retorts that he wants replacements that aren't drunks or womanizers. In response, he is assigned a unit made up entirely of young women, fresh from training.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Worth the HypeMovies like thisCross of Iron (1977)
It is 1943, and the German army—ravaged and demoralised—is hastily retreating from the Russian front. In the midst of the madness, conflict brews between the aristocratic yet ultimately pusillanimous Captain Stransky and the courageous Corporal Steiner. Stransky is the only man who believes that the Third Reich is still vastly superior to the Russian army. However, within his pompous persona lies a quivering coward who longs for the Iron Cross so that he can return to Berlin a hero. Steiner, on the other hand is cynical, defiantly non-conformist and more concerned with the safety of his own men rather than the horde of military decorations offered to him by his superiors.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTankers (2018)
The film is based on the true story about a Soviet KV-1 crew of a Soviet KV-1 tank, under the command of Semyon Konovalov , whom despite being heavily outnumbered by German forces, destroyed 16 tanks, 2 armored vehicles and 8 other enemy vehicles at the village of Nizhnemytyakin, Tarasovsky district, Rostov region on July 13th, 1942.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both war & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisKalashnikov AK-47 (2020)
A Russian military propaganda film about the tank commander Kalashnikov, severely injured in battle in 1941. The accident leaves him incapacitated and unable to return to the front line. While recovering in the hospital, he begins creating the initial sketches of what will become one of the world’s most legendary weapons. A self-taught inventor is only 29 when he develops the now iconic assault riffle — the AK-47. Shot in occupied Crimea.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both war & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisWunderland (2018)
Christmas 1944, The Germans make one final push against the attacking allied armies in the West. Lt. Robert Cappa and his platoon of 2nd Infantry Division soldiers have been ordered to hold a vital road junction against the German aggressors. Cappa and his men must find their faith and strength to stand against their enemy in the epic fight know as "The Battle of The Bulge."
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both war & drama
SnoozefestMovies like thisWarsaw Uprising (2014)
It tells the story of the Warsaw Uprising of 1944 through the eyes of a US airman, escaper from the Nazi Stalag camp and two young reporters, cameramen for the Bureau of Information and Propaganda of the Polish Home Army. Their mission: documenting the Uprising by shooting newsreels for the “Palladium” cinema. Looking for the right shots, they go deeper and deeper – literally and figuratively – into the heart of the Uprising. Traumatic truth becomes obvious. Aware of being witnesses of indescribable events, they realize their duties: to document them and preserve the rolls of film at any cost…
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both war & drama
Battleground (1949)
Members of the U.S. Army's 101st Airborne Division are fighting for their country amidst the rugged terrain of Bastogne, Belgium, in December 1944. Holley and his American compatriots have already seen one of their own, Roderigues, perish under enemy fire. The men try to rebuff another series of Nazi attacks, but what they really need is a change in the weather. Without clear skies, they'll never get the air support they need.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPurge (2012)
Aliide experienced The Great Terror under Stalin’s regime, and decades after her hometown people were deported to Siberia, she lives alone in an isolated house. One night, she finds a young woman in her yard – Zara has just escaped from the claws of the Russian mafia that held her as a sex slave. Survivors both, Aliide and Zara engage in unearthing each other’s motives and gradually their stories merge into one, revealing the tragedy of a family during the cruelest years in Estonian history.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWhite Tiger (2012)
WWII, 1945. After barely surviving a battle with a mysterious, ghostly-white German Tiger tank, Red Army Sergeant Ivan Naydenov becomes obsessed with its destruction.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both war
SnoozefestMovies like thisStalingrad (1993)
A German Platoon is explored through the brutal fighting of the Battle of Stalingrad. After half of their number is wiped out and they're placed under the command of a sadistic captain, the platoon lieutenant leads his men to desert. The platoon members attempt escape from the city, now surrounded by the Soviet Army.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Worth the HypeMovies like thisT-34 (2018)
In 1944, a courageous group of Russian soldiers managed to escape from German captivity in a half-destroyed legendary T-34 tank. Those were the times of unforgettable bravery, fierce fighting, unbreakable love, and legendary miracles.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Worth the HypeMovies like thisAshes and Diamonds (1958)
A young academy soldier, Maciek Chelmicki, is ordered to shoot the secretary of the KW PPR. A coincidence causes him to kill someone else. Meeting face to face with his victim, he gets a shock. He faces the necessity of repeating the assassination. He meets Krystyna, a girl working as a barmaid in the restaurant of the "Monopol" hotel. His affection for her makes him even more aware of the senselessness of killing at the end of the war. Loyalty to the oath he took, and thus the obligation to obey the order, tips the scales.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Four Days of Naples (1962)
September 1943. After Italy surrenders to the Allies, people in Naples believe the war is finally over, but soon they realize Germans are still in control — and as ruthless as ever. Armed with makeshift weapons, civilians rise up en masse against the invaders — and overwhelming odds.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Worth the HypeMovies like thisMy Way Home (1965)
In the aftermath of World War II, a Hungarian teenager, captured by Soviet troops, forms an unlikely bond with a Russian soldier in a remote prison camp.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Ballad of a Soldier (1959)
During World War II, earnest young Russian soldier Alyosha Skvortsov is rewarded with a short leave of absence for performing a heroic deed on the battlefield. Feeling homesick, he decides to visit his mother. Due to his kindhearted nature, however, Alyosha is repeatedly sidetracked by his efforts to help those he encounters, including a lovely girl named Shura. In his tour of a country devastated by war, he struggles to keep hope alive.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThey Fought for Their Motherland (1975)
In July 1942, in the Second World War, the rearguard of the Russian army protects the bridgehead of the Don River against the German army while the retreating Russian troops cross the bridge. While they move back to the Russian territory through the countryside, the soldiers show their companionship, sentiments, fears and heroism to defend their motherland.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both war & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA Midnight Clear (1992)
In 1944 France, an American Intelligence Squad locates a German Platoon wishing to surrender rather than die in Germany's final war offensive. The two groups of men, isolated from the war at present, put aside their differences and spend Christmas together before the surrender plan turns bad and both sides are forced to fight the other.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCome and See (1985)
The invasion of a village in Belarus by German forces sends young Flyora into the forest to join the weary Resistance fighters, against his family's wishes. There he meets a girl, Glasha, who accompanies him back to his village. On returning home, Flyora finds his family and fellow peasants massacred. His continued survival amidst the brutal debris of war becomes increasingly nightmarish, a battle between despair and hope.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both drama & war
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisFortress of War (2010)
The film covers the heroic defence of the Brest Fortress, which was attacked during the first strike of German invaders on June 22 1941. The story describes the events of the first days of the defence, including the three main resistance zones, headed by the regiment commander, Pyotr Mikhailovich Gavrilov, the commissar Efim Moiseevich Fomin and the head of the 9th frontier outpost, Andrey Mitrofanovich Kizhevatov. Many years later veteran Alexander Akimov again recalls the memories of the time, when he, then a 15 year old Sasha Akimov was deeply in love with the beautiful Anya and suddenly found himself in the middle of the bloody events of war.
Why it matches: Fans watch both · both war & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like The Unknown Soldier?
The closest matches to The Unknown Soldier are Unknown Soldier (2017), Ambush (1999) and The Unknown Soldier (1985). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after The Unknown Soldier?
People who watched The Unknown Soldier most often go on to Unknown Soldier (2017), Ambush (1999) and The Unknown Soldier (1985).
What is the highest-rated movie like The Unknown Soldier?
Come and See (1985), rated 8.2/10 by 2,022 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like The Unknown Soldier?
Kalashnikov AK-47 (2020) is the most recent release on this list.
How are movies similar to The Unknown Soldier chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside The Unknown Soldier, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.