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In time for an historical Oscars, Dan Snow unveils History Hit's top 50 greatest historical movies of the last 50 years (with one plucky exception that’s somehow avoided all detection...
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- History Hit
Jan 29, 2023 · Discover a comprehensive compilation of the best movie soundtracks of all time, celebrating iconic film music.
- 274 min
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- Lord Finór
For this list, we’ll be looking at the best films that were praised for their historical authenticity. Our countdown includes "Spotlight"... Historians rejoice!
- 19 min
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- WatchMojo.com
- Frozen – Christophe Beck. In Frozen, Disney animation moves back to its best form. Christophe Beck, composer for the Muppets’ recent big screen outings, wrote touching music that perfectly complemented the songs by Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez.
- Interstellar – Hans Zimmer. Zimmer delivered magnificently for Interstellar, receiving an Oscar nod for his soundtrack. Painstakingly composed over two years, Zimmer visited London’s Temple Church to record its historic organ.
- Casablanca – Max Steiner. The peak of Max Steiner’s noir years, he apparently begged to drop ‘As Time Goes By’ from featuring in the film’s score, but was overruled.
- James Bond Theme – Monty Norman. The most famous guitar riff in cinema has featured in every official Bond film since Dr. No (1962), when it accompanied the opening title.
- Pearl Harbor
- The Remains of The Day
- Howards End
- Gandhi
- Dunkirk
- The Pianist
- The Revenant
- The Iron Lady
- Apocalypse Now
- The Killing Fields
As its title suggests, based on the surprise attack Japan made on Hawaii on 7 December, 1941, Pearl Harbor follows Rafe Mcawley (Ben Affleck), Danny Walker (Josh Hartnett) and Evelyn Johnson (Kate Beckinsale) during the events of World War Two. The two male protagonists are pilots who are at first separated by Affleck’s character going to get real ...
This historical film is both a story about unfulfilled love and an examination of 1930s post-war appeasement and the lessening of old values. An adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro’s 1989 Booker Prize winning novel, the film stars Anthony Hopkins as the ageing butler of Darlington Hall, Stevens, and Emma Thompson as Miss Kenton. The pair brilliantly conve...
James Ivory’s magnificent adaptation of E. M. Forster’s novel of the same name explores the intricacies of the changing landscape of early 20th century Britain via three families from three different classes. It is a valuable depiction of pre-war attitudes towards class, with snobbish attitudes clashing with the struggles of the emerging middle cla...
A co-production between India and the United Kingdom, Gandhi has been praised as a masterpiece of historical biography. Starring Ben Kingsley as Mahatma Gandhi, the film is epic in its scope and ambition. It opens with a transformative moment in 1893, when Gandhi was thrown off a South African train for being in a whites-only compartment. The follo...
This film is perhaps most notable for its anxiety-inducing soundtrack from Hans Zimmer, and a surprising and very well acted cameo from One Direction star Harry Styles. In terms of building the tension of the Dunkirkevacuation, Christopher Nolan’s film is a remarkable piece of film making. However, the mixture of narratives between land, sea and ai...
Perhaps Roman Polanski’s greatest work, The Pianist is a tragic account of the horrors of World War Two. It was based on the autobiography of a Holocaust survivor, titled The Pianist: The Extraordinary True Story of One Man’s Survival in Warsaw, 1939-1945, which tells the story of the Polish-Jewish pianist and composer Władysław Szpilman. The film ...
Loosely based on a true story of survival in nature, grit and vengeance, Alejandro González Iñárritu’s masterpiece follows frontiersman Hugh Glass (Leonardo DiCaprio) who sustains life-threatening injuries from a brutal bear attack and is left for dead by his own hunting team whilst exploring the uncharted wilderness in South Dakota, 1823. Nominate...
Phyllida Lloyd’s biographical drama offers a fascinating look into the longest serving British Prime Minister of the 20th century, Margaret Thatcher. The whole movie is dominated by a tour de forceperformance by Meryl Streep, who received her 17th Academy Award Nomination and third win for Best Actress, once again proving that she is the master of ...
In Apocalypse Now, Francis Ford Coppola re-framed the American war of attrition in Vietnam as a psychotropic nightmare. In the creative struggle of his life, Coppola sought to rework Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad’s 1899 critique of imperialism, into a cinematic epic set during the Vietnam War. It depicts its narrator (Martin Sheen) completing a ...
This British biographical drama is based upon the real life experience of two journalists, one Cambodian, one American. The famously harrowing film depicts the Cambodian genocide under the Khmer Rough regime during its rule of the country between 1975 and 1979, immediately following the Cambodian Civil War (1970-1975). The film’s title, The Killing...
- History Hit
Nov 25, 2021 · From musicals that shed new light on old stories (here's looking at you, Hamilton) to moving films that give unsung heroes the credit they deserve, the best historical films are both...
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What is history hit?
Movies that are both great and based around true events and/or situated in events that happened in our history. The movies on this list are my preference only; Including, but not limited to: being enjoyable, thought provoking, exciting, technically smart, having fine-honed costuming/props/set pieces, and/or having engaging dialogue.
