Movies like Somme 1916, la bataille insensée (2016)
The best movies like Somme 1916, la bataille insensée (2016) are They Shall Not Grow Old (2018), The War on Democracy (2007) and The Soviet Story (2008). If Somme 1916, la bataille insensée hooked you with its documentary and history, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedFor Sama (2019)8.2/10 from 323 votes
- Newest2000 Meters to Andriivka (2025)Released 2025
- In FrenchShoah (1985)Also in French
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 & history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe War on Democracy (2007)
Set both in Latin America and the United States, the film explores the historic and current relationship of Washington with countries such as Venezuela, Bolivia and Chile. Pilger says that the film "...tells a universal story... analysing and revealing, through vivid testimony, the story of great power behind its venerable myths. It allows us to understand the true nature of the so-called "war on terror". According to Pilger, the film’s message is that the greed and power of empire is not invincible and that people power is always the "seed beneath the snow".
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both history & documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe 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
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTrinity and Beyond: The Atomic Bomb Movie (1995)
"Trinity and Beyond" is an unsettling yet visually fascinating documentary presenting the history of nuclear weapons development and testing between 1945-1963. Narrated by William Shatner and featuring an original score performed by the Moscow Symphony Orchestra, this award-winning documentary reveals previously unreleased and classified government footage from several countries.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & history
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Hornet's Nest (2014)
Armed only with their cameras, Peabody and Emmy Award-winning conflict Journalist Mike Boettcher, and his son, Carlos, provide unprecedented access into the longest war in U.S. history: they are embed with U.S. troops during nine days of intense combat in Afghanistan.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both war & documentary
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe 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
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWhy 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
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisFather 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
Popcorn FlickMovies like this2000 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
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisThe 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
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisKorengal (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
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisHôtel Terminus: The Life and Times of Klaus Barbie (1988)
Marcel Ophuls' riveting film details the heinous legacy of the Gestapo head dubbed "The Butcher of Lyon." Responsible for over 4,000 deaths in occupied France during World War II, Barbie would escape—with U.S. help—to South America in 1951, where he lived until a global manhunt led to his 1983 arrest and subsequent trial.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both war & documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisCity of Ghosts (2017)
With unprecedented access, this documentary follows the extraordinary journey of “Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently”—a group of anonymous citizen journalists who banded together after their homeland was overtaken by ISIS—as they risk their lives to stand up against one of the greatest evils in the world today.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both war & documentary
Worth the HypeMovies like thisVirunga (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
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisLet 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
Worth the HypeMovies like thisFor 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
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisShoah (1985)
Director Claude Lanzmann spent 11 years on this sprawling documentary about the Holocaust, conducting his own interviews and refusing to use a single frame of archival footage. Dividing Holocaust witnesses into three categories – survivors, bystanders, and perpetrators – Lanzmann presents testimonies from survivors of the Chelmno concentration camp, an Auschwitz escapee, and witnesses of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, as well as a chilling report of gas chambers from an SS officer at Treblinka.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & history
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisMaking Waves: The Art of Cinematic Sound (2019)
The history of cinematic sound, told by legendary sound designers and visionary filmmakers.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & history
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Untold History Of The United States (2012)
Oliver Stone charts the history of the United States from the Second World War to the present.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & history
Absolute CinemaMovies like this20 Days in Mariupol (2023)
As the Russian invasion begins, a team of Ukrainian journalists trapped in the besieged city of Mariupol struggle to continue their work documenting the war's atrocities.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both documentary & war
Absolute CinemaMovies like this1914 invasion of Belgium (2014)
The small Belgian army held up the German advance, the British Expeditionary Force fought its first battle and the invincible German army was brought to a standstill in Belgium. This film traces that first month, the battles of Liège, Antwerp and Mons. In reconstruction it uses the words of those who took part and looks at the remains of the battlefields and the fortifications that still exist.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both war & history
The Millionaires' Unit (2015)
A documentary about the First Yale Unit, a group of Yale students who trained for World War I.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both war & documentary
Paris 1900 (2019)
In 1900, the eyes of the whole world are on Paris. The World's Fair welcomed 50 million amazed visitors, and the city celebrated itself in a glamorous era. This period went down in history as the "Belle Époque." Elaborately restored and colorized historical photographs bring to life the exciting life in Paris between the end of the 19th century and the beginning of World War I in 1914. Bicycles, cars, airplanes, moving pictures, newly founded film studios, revolutionary composers and painters, avant-garde ballet performances, fashion houses, summer resorts on the Atlantic coast – life was intoxicating. People celebrate in the variety shows, cabarets, and revue theaters of Paris. Moulin Rouge, Folies Bergères, Bal Tabarin—in Paris, the nights are long and life is too short to sleep through. It is a dance on the volcano, given the political developments in the world.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary & history
Black Is the Color: African-American Artists and Segregation (2016)
Black Is the Color highlights key moments in the history of Black visual art, from Edmonds Lewis’s 1867 sculpture Forever Free, to the work of contemporary artists such as Whitfield Lovell, Kerry James Marshall, Ellen Gallagher, and Jean-Michel Basquiat. Art historians and gallery owners place the works in context, setting them against the larger social contexts of Jim Crow, WWI, the civil rights movement and the racism of the Reagan era, while contemporary artists discuss individual works by their forerunners and their ongoing influence.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary & history
The Ode to Joy (2006)
Based on the true story of the Bandō prisoner-of-war camp in World War I. It depicts the friendship of the German POWs with the director of the camp and local residents at the stage of Naruto, Tokushima Prefecture, in Japan.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both history & war
The Battle of the Somme (1916)
A documentary and propaganda film which shows the British Army's preparations for, and the early stages of, the battle of the Somme.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary & war
Sarajevo: Beginning of a Disaster (2014)
Sarajevo, late June 1914: A Serbian nationalist shoots the Austro-Hungarian heir to the throne and his wife. A few weeks later, war raged in Europe with devastating consequences.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both documentary & history
Osudy dobrého vojáka Švejka – Švejkova budějovická anabase (1956)
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both war
Osudy dobrého vojáka Švejka – Švejkovy nehody ve vlaku (1955)
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both war
Osudy dobrého vojáka Švejka – Z Hatvanu na hranice Haliče (1954)
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both war
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Somme 1916, la bataille insensée?
The closest matches to Somme 1916, la bataille insensée are They Shall Not Grow Old (2018), The War on Democracy (2007) and The Soviet Story (2008). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Somme 1916, la bataille insensée?
Start with They Shall Not Grow Old (2018), the closest match to Somme 1916, la bataille insensée.
What is the highest-rated movie like Somme 1916, la bataille insensée?
For Sama (2019), rated 8.2/10 by 323 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Somme 1916, la bataille insensée?
2000 Meters to Andriivka (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there French movies like Somme 1916, la bataille insensée?
Yes: Shoah (1985), Paris 1900 (2019) and Black Is the Color: African-American Artists and Segregation (2016).
How are movies similar to Somme 1916, la bataille insensée chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Somme 1916, la bataille insensée, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.