Movies like Commandos Strike at Dawn (1942)
The best movies like Commandos Strike at Dawn (1942) are Edge of Darkness (1943), The Heroes of Telemark (1965) and A Hidden Life (2019). If Commandos Strike at Dawn hooked you with its war and drama, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedWhen the Wind Blows (1986)7.5/10 from 360 votes
- NewestBonhoeffer: Pastor. Spy. Assassin (2024)Released 2024
Edge of Darkness (1943)
The film pivots around the local Norwegian doctor and his family. The doctor's wife (Ruth Gordon) wants to hold on to the pretence of gracious living and ignore their German occupiers. The doctor, Martin Stensgard (Walter Huston), would also prefer to stay neutral, but is torn. His brother-in-law, the wealthy owner of the local fish cannery, collaborates with the Nazis. The doctor's daughter, Karen (Ann Sheridan), is involved with the resistance and with its leader Gunnar Brogge (Errol Flynn). The doctor's son has just returned to town, having been sent down from the university, and is soon influenced by his Nazi-sympathizer uncle. Captain Koenig (Helmut Dantine), the young German commandant of the occupying garrison, whose fanatic determination to do everything by the book and spoutings about the invincibility of the Reich hides a growing fear of a local uprising.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Heroes of Telemark (1965)
Set in German-occupied Norway, resistance fighter Knut Straud enlists the reluctant physicist Rolf Pedersen in an effort to destroy the German heavy water production plant in rural Telemark.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisA Hidden Life (2019)
Austrian farmer Franz Jägerstätter faces the threat of execution for refusing to fight for the Nazis during World War II.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & war
Worth the HypeMovies like this633 Squadron (1964)
When Norwegian resistance leader Lieutenant Erik Bergman reports the location of a German V-2 rocket fuel plant, the Royal Air Force's 633 Squadron is assigned the mission to destroy it. The plant is in a seemingly-impregnable location beneath an overhanging cliff at the end of a long, narrow fjord lined with anti-aircraft guns. The only way to destroy the plant is by collapsing the cliff on top of it.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisTwelve O'Clock High (1949)
In the early days of daylight bombing raids over Germany, General Frank Savage must take command of a 'hard luck' bomber group. Much of the story deals with his struggle to whip his group into a disciplined fighting unit in spite of heavy losses, and withering attacks by German fighters over their targets.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both war & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisBonhoeffer: Pastor. Spy. Assassin (2024)
As the world teeters on the brink of annihilation, Dietrich Bonhoeffer joins a deadly plot to assassinate Hitler, risking his faith and fate to save millions of Jews from genocide.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDefiance (2008)
Based on a true story, during World War II, four Jewish brothers escape their Nazi-occupied homeland of West Belarus in Poland and join the Soviet partisans to combat the Nazis. The brothers begin the rescue of roughly 1,200 Jews still trapped in the ghettos of Poland.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Zone of Interest (2023)
The commandant of Auschwitz, Rudolf Höss, and his wife Hedwig, strive to build a dream life for their family in a house and garden next to the camp.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & war
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGoodnight, Mister Tom (1998)
A shy and quiet World War II evacuee is housed by a disgruntled old man, and they soon develop a close bond.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & war
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe War Below (2021)
During World War I, a group of British miners are recruited to tunnel underneath no man's land and set bombs from below the German front in hopes of breaking the deadly stalemate of the Battle of Messines.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both war & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe One That Got Away (1957)
Based on the true story of Oberleutnant Franz von Werra, the only German prisoner of war captured in Britain to escape back to Germany during the Second World War.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both war & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWaiting for Anya (2020)
During the harrows of WWII, Jo, a young shepherd along with the help of the widow Horcada, helps to smuggle Jewish children across the border from southern France into Spain.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWalking with the Enemy (2014)
Regent Horthy is the leader of Hungary and a German ally, but his favorable standing with Hitler changes as the war comes to an end. Forced to cede Hungary’s power or else witness the execution of his son, Regent Horthy gives up control of his country to the Nazis, who quickly move Hungarians to ghettos and death camps, with no hope in sight. But the despair changes when a young man named Elek emerges. Separated from his family during the relocations and aided by the woman he loves , Elek defies the enemy by becoming one of them. In a race against time, disguised as a Nazi Officer he embarks on a mission to save his family and thousands of his countrymen.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Eagle Has Landed (1976)
When the Nazi high command learns in late 1943 that Winston Churchill will be spending time at a country estate in Norfolk, it hatches an audacious scheme to kidnap the prime minister and spirit him to Germany for enforced negotiations with Hitler.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWhen the Wind Blows (1986)
With the help of government-issued pamphlets, an elderly British couple build a shelter and prepare for an impending nuclear attack, unaware that times and the nature of war have changed from their romantic memories of World War II.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both war & drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisMudbound (2017)
In the post–World War II South, two families are pitted against a barbaric social hierarchy and an unrelenting landscape as they simultaneously fight the battle at home and the battle abroad.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Worth the HypeMovies like thisEye of the Needle (1981)
Great Britain, 1944, during World War II. Relentlessly pursued by several MI5 agents, Henry Faber the Needle, a ruthless German spy in possession of vital information about D-Day, takes refuge on Storm Island, an inhospitable, sparsely inhabited island off the coast of northern Scotland.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSince You Went Away (1944)
In 1943, several people enter, re-enter, and exit the difficult life of a Midwestern family whose patriarch has been called up to war, leaving behind his wife and two teen daughters.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWolf Hound (2022)
Inspired by the real-life German special operations unit KG 200 that shot down, repaired, and flew Allied aircraft as Trojan horses, "Wolf Hound" takes place in 1944 German-occupied France and follows the daring exploits of Jewish-American fighter pilot Captain David Holden. Ambushed behind enemy lines, Holden must rescue a captured B-17 Flying Fortress crew, evade a ruthless enemy stalking him at every turn, and foil a plot that could completely alter the outcome of World War II.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisAmerican Pastoral (2016)
Set in postwar America, a man watches his seemingly perfect life fall apart as his daughter's new political affiliation threatens to destroy their family.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisGuerrilla Girl (1953)
During World War II, Helmut Dantine specialized in playing villainous Nazis in Hollywood melodramas. He offers a compelling performance in a variation of these earlier roles in this suspense filled and politically loaded tale of intrigue. The story opens in German-occupied Athens during the darkest hours of the war. Civilians are not allowed on the streets after dark.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & war
Saints and Soldiers (2003)
Five American soldiers fighting in Europe during World War II struggle to return to Allied territory after being separated from U.S. forces during the historic Malmedy Massacre.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both war & drama
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEmpire of the Sun (1987)
Jamie Graham, a privileged English boy, is living in Shanghai when the Japanese invade and force all foreigners into prison camps. Jamie is captured with an American sailor, who looks out for him while they are in the camp together. Even though he is separated from his parents and in a hostile environment, Jamie maintains his dignity and youthful spirit, providing a beacon of hope for the others held captive with him.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & war
Worth the HypeMovies like thisBloody Land (1976)
Film set in three different times. In the beginning, Miti is killed while defending his land. Then, the film focuses on his son Gjergji who fights against the Italian forces. In the end, the land is redistributed by the agrarian reform.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both war & drama
They Were Four (1977)
Four partisans are tasked with delivering a song to the Congress of Përmet.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & war
Charlotte (2022)
The true story of Charlotte Salomon, a young German-Jewish painter who comes of age in Berlin on the eve of the Second World War. Fiercely imaginative and deeply gifted, she dreams of becoming an artist. Her first love applauds her talent, which emboldens her resolve. When anti-Semitic policies inspire violent mobs, she escapes to the safety of the South of France. There she begins to paint again, and finds new love. But her work is interrupted, this time by a family tragedy that reveals an even darker secret. Believing that only an extraordinary act will save her, she embarks on the monumental adventure of painting her life story.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & war
The Girls with the Red Ribbons (1978)
Jeta is a student who is a member of the illegals and tries to create a group of antifascist girls in her school.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both war & drama
The Caine Mutiny (1954)
When a US Naval captain shows signs of mental instability that jeopardize his ship, the first officer relieves him of command and faces court martial for mutiny.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & war
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTea with Mussolini (1999)
In 1930s fascist Italy, adolescent Luca just lost his mother. His father, a callous businessman, sends him to be taken care of by British expatriate Mary Wallace. Mary and her cultured friends - including artist Arabella, young widow Elsa, and archaeologist Georgie - keep a watchful eye over the boy. But the women's cultivated lives take a dramatic turn when Allied forces declare war on Mussolini.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama & war
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisJoy Division (2006)
A teenage orphan fights against the Red Army at the end of WWII and in the aftermath is 'adopted' by a Commissar. Years later he is sent to London during the Cold war to work for the KGB, where he questions his life.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both drama
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Commandos Strike at Dawn?
The closest matches to Commandos Strike at Dawn are Edge of Darkness (1943), The Heroes of Telemark (1965) and A Hidden Life (2019). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Commandos Strike at Dawn?
Start with Edge of Darkness (1943), the closest match to Commandos Strike at Dawn.
What is the highest-rated movie like Commandos Strike at Dawn?
When the Wind Blows (1986), rated 7.5/10 by 360 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Commandos Strike at Dawn?
Bonhoeffer: Pastor. Spy. Assassin (2024) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like Commandos Strike at Dawn?
Yes: Edge of Darkness (1943), The Heroes of Telemark (1965) and A Hidden Life (2019).
How are movies similar to Commandos Strike at Dawn chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Commandos Strike at Dawn, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.