The Most Beautifully Written Movies About History, and Not Just War Movies

Inspired by historical events, historical movies aren’t like the documentaries you’d watch in history class. As you watch the story unfold, history is revealed and told in the perspective of the story teller. And in this list, we believe that you will find the one of most moving stories ever made into a movie! Enjoy.

1

Schindler's List

Liam Neeson, Ben Kingsley, Ralph Fiennes
Steven Spielberg
1993

The true story of how businessman Oskar Schindler saved over a thousand Jewish lives from the Nazis while they worked as slaves in his factory during World War II.

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8.9 IMDB
2

The Pianist

Adrien Brody, Thomas Kretschmann, Frank Finlay
Roman Polanski
2002

The true story of pianist Władysław Szpilman's experiences in Warsaw during the Nazi occupation. When the Jews of the city find themselves forced into a ghetto, Szpilman finds work playing in a café; and when his family is deported in 1942, he stays behind, works for a while as a laborer, and eventually goes into hiding in the ruins of the war-torn city.

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8.5 IMDB
3

Braveheart

Mel Gibson, Catherine McCormack, Sophie Marceau
Mel Gibson
1995

Enraged at the slaughter of Murron, his new bride and childhood love, Scottish warrior William Wallace slays a platoon of the local English lord's soldiers. This leads the village to revolt and, eventually, the entire country to rise up against English rule.

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8.3 IMDB
4

The Look of Silence

Adi Rukun, M.Y. Basrun, Amir Hasan
Joshua Oppenheimer
2014

A family that survives the genocide in Indonesia confronts the men who killed one of their brothers.

8.3 IMDB
5

Hotel Rwanda

Don Cheadle, Sophie Okonedo, Nick Nolte
Terry George
2004

Inspired by true events, this film takes place in Rwanda in the 1990s when more than a million Tutsis were killed in a genocide that went mostly unnoticed by the rest of the world. Hotel owner Paul Rusesabagina houses over a thousand refuges in his hotel in attempt to save their lives.

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8.1 IMDB
6

12 Years a Slave

Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender, Lupita Nyong\'o
Steve McQueen
2013

In the pre-Civil War United States, Solomon Northup, a free black man from upstate New York, is abducted and sold into slavery. Facing cruelty as well as unexpected kindnesses Solomon struggles not only to stay alive, but to retain his dignity. In the twelfth year of his unforgettable odyssey, Solomon’s chance meeting with a Canadian abolitionist will forever alter his life.

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8.1 IMDB
7

Hacksaw Ridge

Andrew Garfield, Sam Worthington, Vince Vaughn
Mel Gibson
2016

WWII American Army Medic Desmond T. Doss, who served during the Battle of Okinawa, refuses to kill people and becomes the first Conscientious Objector in American history to receive the Congressional Medal of Honor.

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8.1 IMDB
8

The Imitation Game

Benedict Cumberbatch, Keira Knightley, Matthew Goode
Morten Tyldum
2014

Based on the real life story of legendary cryptanalyst Alan Turing, the film portrays the nail-biting race against time by Turing and his brilliant team of code-breakers at Britain's top-secret Government Code and Cypher School at Bletchley Park, during the darkest days of World War II.

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8 IMDB
9

The King's Speech

Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush, Helena Bonham Carter
Tom Hooper
2010

The King's Speech tells the story of the man who became King George VI, the father of Queen Elizabeth II. After his brother abdicates, George ('Bertie') reluctantly assumes the throne. Plagued by a dreaded stutter and considered unfit to be king, Bertie engages the help of an unorthodox speech therapist named Lionel Logue. Through a set of unexpected techniques, and as a result of an unlikely friendship, Bertie is able to find his voice and boldly lead the country into war.

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8 IMDB
10

Captain Phillips

Tom Hanks, Barkhad Abdi, Catherine Keener
Paul Greengrass
2013

The true story of Captain Richard Phillips and the 2009 hijacking by Somali pirates of the US-flagged MV Maersk Alabama, the first American cargo ship to be hijacked in two hundred years.

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7.8 IMDB
11

Argo

Ben Affleck, Alan Arkin, Bryan Cranston
Ben Affleck
2012

As the Iranian revolution reaches a boiling point, a CIA 'exfiltration' specialist concocts a risky plan to free six Americans who have found shelter at the home of the Canadian ambassador.

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7.7 IMDB
12

Bridge of Spies

Tom Hanks, Mark Rylance, Amy Ryan
Steven Spielberg
2015

During the Cold War, the Soviet Union captures U.S. pilot Francis Gary Powers after shooting down his U-2 spy plane. Sentenced to 10 years in prison, Powers' only hope is New York lawyer James Donovan, recruited by a CIA operative to negotiate his release. Donovan boards a plane to Berlin, hoping to win the young man's freedom through a prisoner exchange. If all goes well, the Russians would get Rudolf Abel, the convicted spy who Donovan defended in court.

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7.6 IMDB
13

The Flowers of War

Christian Bale, Ni Ni, Tong Dawei
Zhang Yimou
2011

A Westerner finds refuge with a group of women in a church during Japan's rape of Nanking in 1937. Posing as a priest, he attempts to lead the women to safety.

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7.6 IMDB
14

42

Chadwick Boseman, Harrison Ford, Nicole Beharie
Brian Helgeland
2013

The powerful story of Jackie Robinson, the legendary baseball player who broke Major League Baseball’s color barrier when he joined the roster of the Brooklyn Dodgers. The film follows the innovative Dodgers’ general manager Branch Rickey, the MLB executive who first signed Robinson to the minors and then helped to bring him up to the show.

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7.5 IMDB
15

Invictus

Morgan Freeman, Matt Damon, Tony Kgoroge
Clint Eastwood
2009

Newly elected President Nelson Mandela knows his nation remains racially and economically divided in the wake of apartheid. Believing he can bring his people together through the universal language of sport, Mandela rallies South Africa's rugby team as they make their historic run to the 1995 Rugby World Cup Championship match.

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7.3 IMDB
16

Silence

Andrew Garfield, Adam Driver, Liam Neeson
Martin Scorsese
2016

Two Jesuit priests travel to seventeenth century Japan which has, under the Tokugawa shogunate, banned Catholicism and almost all foreign contact.

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7.2 IMDB
17

Unbroken

Jack O\'Connell, Domhnall Gleeson, Garrett Hedlund
Angelina Jolie
2014

A chronicle of the life of Louis Zamperini, an Olympic runner who was taken prisoner by Japanese forces during World War II.

7.2 IMDB
18

The Post

Meryl Streep, Tom Hanks, Bob Odenkirk
Steven Spielberg
2017

A cover-up that spanned four U.S. Presidents pushed the country's first female newspaper publisher and a hard-driving editor to join an unprecedented battle between journalist and government. Inspired by true events.

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7.2 IMDB
19

Midsommar

Florence Pugh, Jack Reynor, Vilhelm Blomgren
Ari Aster
2019

Several friends travel to Sweden to study as anthropologists a summer festival that is held every ninety years in the remote hometown of one of them. What begins as a dream vacation in a place where the sun never sets, gradually turns into a dark nightmare as the mysterious inhabitants invite them to participate in their disturbing festive activities.

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7.1 IMDB
20

The Zookeeper's Wife

Jessica Chastain, Daniel Brühl, Johan Heldenbergh
Niki Caro
2017

The account of keepers of the Warsaw Zoo, Jan and Antonina Zabinski, who helped save hundreds of people and animals during the Nazi invasion.

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7 IMDB
21

A Private War

Rosamund Pike, Jamie Dornan, Tom Hollander
Matthew Heineman
2018

One of the most celebrated war correspondents of our time, Marie Colvin is an utterly fearless and rebellious spirit, driven to the frontlines of conflicts across the globe to give voice to the voiceless.

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6.7 IMDB