D-Day: The Untold Stories

To commemorate the 75th anniversary of D-Day, this special presents the key events of the Allied invasion of Nazi-held Europe and the subsequent battles that captured the control of the Normandy coast. Some of the last surviving veterans recall in detail the terror, patriotism and drama from the frontlines of war. This special also honors the diverse backgrounds of all who served.

Stalag 17

After two American prisoners are killed by guards in the act of escaping from a German POW camp in World War II, barracks black marketeer J.J. Sefton is suspected of being an informer.

Soldier of Orange

The lives of Erik Lanshof and five of his closest friends take different paths when the German army invades the Netherlands in 1940: fight and resistance, fear and resignation, collaboration and high treason.

Life Is Beautiful

A touching story of an Italian book seller of Jewish ancestry who lives in his own little fairy tale. His creative and happy life would come to an abrupt halt when his entire family is deported to a concentration camp during World War II. While locked up he tries to convince his son that the whole thing is just a game.

Gandhi

In the early years of the 20th century, Mohandas K. Gandhi, a British-trained lawyer, forsakes all worldly possessions to take up the cause of Indian independence. Faced with armed resistance from the British government, Gandhi adopts a policy of 'passive resistance', endeavouring to win freedom for his people without resorting to bloodshed.

Closely Watched Trains

At a village railway station in occupied Czechoslovakia, a bumbling dispatcher’s apprentice longs to liberate himself from his virginity. Oblivious to the war and the resistance that surrounds him, this young man embarks on a journey of sexual awakening and self-discovery, encountering a universe of frustration, eroticism, and adventure within his sleepy backwater depot.

Pastor Hall

The village of Altdorf has to come to terms with Chancellor Hitler and the arrival of a platoon of Stormtroopers. The Stormtroopers go about teaching and enforcing "The New Order", but Pastor Hall, a kind and gentle man, won't be cowed. Some villagers join the Nazi party avidly, and some just go along with things, hoping for a quiet life, but Pastor Hall takes his convictions to the pulpit.

Za frontom

The Bridge on the River Kwai

The classic story of English POWs in Burma forced to build a bridge to aid the war effort of their Japanese captors. British and American intelligence officers conspire to blow up the structure, but Col. Nicholson, the commander who supervised the bridge's construction, has acquired a sense of pride in his creation and tries to foil their plans.

Enemy at the Gates

A Russian and a German sniper play a game of cat-and-mouse during the Battle of Stalingrad in WWII.

Saving Private Ryan

As U.S. troops storm the beaches of Normandy, three brothers lie dead on the battlefield, with a fourth trapped behind enemy lines. Ranger captain John Miller and seven men are tasked with penetrating German-held territory and bringing the boy home.

Slingboy

A young Czech boy is freed from a concentration camp and now is working for the army against the Germans.

Judgment at Nuremberg

In 1947, four German judges who served on the bench during the Nazi regime face a military tribunal to answer charges of crimes against humanity. Chief Justice Haywood hears evidence and testimony not only from lead defendant Ernst Janning and his defense attorney Hans Rolfe, but also from the widow of a Nazi general, an idealistic U.S. Army captain and reluctant witness Irene Wallner.

The Great Love

The attractive Oberleutnant Paul Wendlandt is stationed in North Africa as a fighter pilot. While in Berlin to deliver a report he is given a day's leave, and on the stage of the cabaret theatre "Skala" sees the popular Danish singer Hanna Holberg. For Paul it is love at first sight. When Hanna visits friends after the end of the performance, he follows her, and speaks to her in the U-Bahn. After the party in her friends' flat, he accompanies her home and chance throws them further together when an air raid warning forces them to take cover in the air raid shelter. Hanna reciprocates Paul's feelings, but after a night spent together Paul has to return immediately to the front. There now follows a whole series of misunderstandings, and one missed opportunity after another. While Hanna waits in vain for some sign of life from Paul, he is flying on missions in North Africa. When he tries to visit her in her Berlin flat, she is giving a Christmas concert in Paris.

Seven Years in Tibet

Austrian mountaineer Heinrich Harrer journeys to the Himalayas without his family to head an expedition in 1939. But when World War II breaks out, the arrogant Harrer falls into Allied forces' hands as a prisoner of war. He escapes with a fellow detainee and makes his way to Lhasa, Tibet, where he meets the 14-year-old Dalai Lama, whose friendship ultimately transforms his outlook on life.

The Mortal Storm

The Roth family leads a quiet life in a small village in the German Alps during the early 1930s. After the Nazis come to power, the family is divided and Martin Breitner, a family friend, is caught up in the turmoil.

Antonia's Line

After World War II, Antonia and her daughter, Danielle, go back to their Dutch hometown, where Antonia's late mother has bestowed a small farm upon her. There, Antonia settles down and joins a tightly-knit but unusual community. Those around her include quirky friend Crooked Finger, would-be suitor Bas and, eventually for Antonia, a granddaughter and great-granddaughter who help create a strong family of empowered women.

The Best Years of Our Lives

It's the hope that sustains the spirit of every GI: the dream of the day when he will finally return home. For three WWII veterans, the day has arrived. But for each man, the dream is about to become a nightmare.

The Great Dictator

Dictator Adenoid Hynkel tries to expand his empire while a poor Jewish barber tries to avoid persecution from Hynkel's regime.

Stella. A Life.

Stella, grows up in Berlin during the rule of the Nazi regime. She dreams of a career as a jazz singer, despite all the repressive measures she is forced to go into hiding with her parents in 1944, her life turns into a culpable tragedy.

Paradise Road

A group of English, American, Dutch and Australian women creates a vocal orchestra while being imprisoned in a Japanese POW camp on Sumatra during World War II.

The Zone of Interest

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.

Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS

Ilsa, a warden at a Nazi death camp that conducts experiments on prisoners, strives to prove that women can withstand more pain and suffering than men, and therefore should be allowed to fight on the frontlines.

Escape from Sobibor

The true story of WWII's notorious Sobibor Nazi death camp, where a courageous inmate orchestrates and leads the escape of over 300 prisoners.

The Bunker

Dramatization depicting the events surrounding Adolf Hitler's last weeks in and around his underground bunker in Berlin before and during the battle for the city.

The Match

Inspired by true events from the spring of 1944 when the Nazis organized a football match between a team of camp inmates and an elite Nazi team on Adolf Hitler's birthday. A match the prisoners are determined to win, no matter what happens.

Kapo

Determined to survive at any price, Edith, a young Jewish woman deported to an extermination camp, manages to survive by accepting the role of kapo, a privileged prisoner whose mission is to ruthlessly guard other prisoners.

Waiting for Anya

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.

Escape to Victory

A group of POWs in a German prison camp during World War II play the German National Soccer Team in this powerful film depicting the role of prisoners during wartime.

The World Will Tremble

The incredible, untold true story of how a group of prisoners attempt a seemingly impossible escape from the first Nazi death camp in order to provide the first eyewitness account of the Holocaust.

Mother Night

An American spy behind the lines during WWII serves as a Nazi propagandist, a role he cannot escape in his future life as he can never reveal his real role in the war.

The Grey Zone

The story of Auschwitz's twelfth Sonderkommando — one of the thirteen consecutive "Special Squads" of Jewish prisoners placed by the Nazis in the excruciating moral dilemma of assisting in the extermination of fellow Jews in exchange for a few more months of life.

The Truce

After the liberation of Auschwitz, an Italian prisoner of War begins a torturous voyage home to Turin, through a Europe caught between war and peace.

The Courageous Heart of Irena Sendler

Irena Sendler is a Catholic social worker who has sympathized with the Jews since her childhood, when her physician father died of typhus contracted while treating poor Jewish patients. When she initially proposes saving Jewish children from the Warsaw Ghetto, her idea is met with skepticism by fellow workers, her parish priest, and even her own mother Janina.

Attack and Retreat

Chronicle of the unheralded and unsuccessful invasion of the Soviet Union by the Italian army during World War II.

Many Wars Ago

Time after time, soldiers of the Italian Army are forced to leave their mountain trenches in attempts to storm an enemy fortress, always with the same disastrous results. As casualties mount, indignation spreads among the rank and file. Disturbed by his superiors' decisions, Lieutenant Sassu is led to question the purpose of war and reconsider where his real duties lie.

Nuremberg

In postwar Germany, an American psychiatrist must determine whether Nazi prisoners are fit to go on trial for war crimes, and finds himself in a complex battle of intellect and ethics with Hermann Göring, Hitler's right-hand man.

Irena's Vow

19 year old Irena Gut is promoted to housekeeper in the home of a highly respected Nazi officer in Poland when she finds out that the Jewish ghetto is about to be liquidated. Determined to help twelve Jewish workers, she decides to shelter them in the safest place she can think of – the basement of the German Major's house. Over the next eight months, Irena uses her wit, humour and immense courage to hide her friends as long as possible.

Men in War

In Korea, on 6 September 1950, Lieutenant Benson's platoon finds itself isolated in enemy-held territory after a retreat. Soon they are joined by Sergeant Montana, whose overriding concern is caring for his catatonic colonel. Benson and Montana can't stand each other, but together they must get the survivors to Hill 465, where they hope the division is waiting. It's a long, harrowing march, fraught with all the dangers the elusive enemy can summon.

Conspiracy

At the Wannsee Conference on January 20, 1942, senior Nazi officials meet to determine the manner in which the so-called "Final Solution to the Jewish Question" can be best implemented.