"Not anxious to die sir, just anxious to matter."
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00:00Immersing the viewer in the hellish conditions and life or death nature of armed conflict,
00:04war movies have provided a blank canvas to some of the most evocative and unforgettable performances
00:09in the cinematic medium. Naturally, with it being one of the most prolific genres in the medium,
00:15there have been plenty of films and performances that have snuck beneath the radar and haven't
00:20really gotten the flowers they deserve. Many of these performances even feature in more widely
00:25lauded and iconic war films, but are generally less talked about either because of a lack of screen
00:30time or because of another great performance garnering more acclaim. Either way, let's get
00:35into it. I'm Ewan, this is War Culture, and here are 10 massively underrated war movie performances.
00:42Number 10. Elias Kataeus – The Thin Red Line Terrence Malick's The Thin Red Line is a masterpiece
00:48that almost transcends the war movie genre, offering a stark lyrical meditation on the nature of humanity
00:55and why we are so compelled to rend ourselves and our planet in two.
00:59Less structured than the other 90s WWII masterpiece of its time, Saving Private Ryan,
01:04The Thin Red Line sees Malick linger on moments of seeming insignificance, as well as fluctuate the
01:10focus of the story. The film boasts an impressive cast rounded out by A-list talent like George Clooney
01:16and John Travolta, but screen time for each actor is fleeting. Thus, each performance takes on a new kind
01:23of urgency and believability. In other words, they feel lived in. And I would argue the performance
01:29that sits at the top of these is Elias Kataeus' turn as Cap'n Staros, the ill-fated company leader
01:35who was pressed to sacrifice his men to take a defended Japanese position during the Solomon Islands
01:40campaign. Kataeus, who you may recognize as Casey Jones in that supremely underrated 1990 Teenager
01:48Fruit Ninja Turtles movie, as well as David Fincher's 2007 masterpiece Zodiac, gives one of his best
01:53performances in The Thin Red Line. His character gets relatively little to say compared to Nick
01:58Nolte, who dominates the sequence as the commanding officer barking orders, but he renders the most
02:03heartbreaking moments of the film. All Staros wants to do is keep his men safe, but it ultimately costs
02:09him a trip out of the Pacific and back home. Kataeus is merged excellently by Nolte for these scenes,
02:15and there's certainly an argument that the latter also delivers one of the most underrated war movie
02:20performances as well. Even so, Kataeus' portrayal of the overwhelmed but kind-hearted Staros
02:26definitely deserves further praise. 9. Cillian Murphy – The Wind That Shakes The Barley
02:32Ken Loach's 2006 effort The Wind That Shakes The Barley is one of the very best films about the
02:38Irish War of Independence and the subsequent Civil War, and at its heart sits Cillian Murphy. Murphy,
02:44by this point still relatively early into his career, portrays a young Irish man by the name
02:50of Damian O'Donovan, brother to Padre Delaney's Teddy. The film depicts the two brothers as they
02:55grow increasingly involved in the struggle against the British Crown, and then become divided over the
03:00Anglo-Irish Treaty. Damian sides with the anti-treaty forces, while Teddy aligns himself with the Irish Free
03:08State. Typical of Loach's films, The Wind That Shakes The Barley is a raw, brutally poignant entry in the
03:14war movie genre. Murphy is electric as the politically fired-up Damian, galvanized by
03:20atrocities, and compelled to give everything to the cause, even if that means his own humanity.
03:278. Burt Lancaster – The Train One of Hollywood's original tough guys with a tender heart,
03:33Burt Lancaster is one of the more celebrated names in cinematic history. As such, it's kind of shocking
03:39that one of the four-time Academy Award nominees' finest performances among his extensive filmography
03:45often goes overlooked, particularly one that came during the peak of director John Frankenheimer's
03:50career. 1964's black-and-white movie The Train follows Lancaster's French Resistance member Paul
03:56Labiche. His character is tasked with intercepting a German locomotive carrying stolen art masterpieces
04:02back to the fatherland, finding himself up against Paul Schofield's nefarious Colonel Von Volheim.
04:08In a war film performance for the ages, Lancaster brings astounding depth and legitimacy to this
04:13reluctant hero. He is perfect for the role, conveying an exhausted urgency as he's forced to risk life and
04:20limb when the Allies are already so close to Paris, and he'll fight a vainglorious officer who will
04:27happily mangle anyone to satiate his act of cultural vandalism. Frankenheimer's The Train is a war movie
04:33masterpiece, and the final scene where Labiche confronts Von Valdheim leaves behind a devastating
04:39echo. 7. Tom Hardy – Dunkirk
04:43It speaks volumes to the ineffable quality of Tom Hardy's performance in Dunkirk. He has about 10 lines
04:49of dialogue throughout Christopher Nolan's 2017 war epic, but still turns in a magnificent turn as Farrier,
04:55aka Fortis One. A Spitfire pilot lending invaluable air support in the skies over the British Channel
05:01and the beaches of Dunkirk, Hardy's aviator manages to efficiently, and superbly, convey a
05:07cascade of feelings. Remarkably, or not depending on your opinions of his performance as Bane in The
05:12Dark Knight Rises, Hardy manages to do this despite having his facial features obscured by an oxygen mask
05:18for the vast majority of the film. The segments depicting Farrier in aerial combat are nail-biting,
05:24and the climactic moment in which he decides to sacrifice the remainder of his fuel serves as a
05:29notable highlight for this criminally underappreciated role.
05:326. David Warner – Cross of Iron
05:36Although more at home in the Western genre, Wild Bunch direct The Sam Peckinpher turned in an
05:41all-timer of a war film with 1977's Cross of Iron. Told from the German perspective of the declining
05:47Eastern Front in World War II, Cross of Iron follows battle-hardened German soldier Rolf Steiner,
05:53played by James Coburn, and his unit as they have a new commanding officer forced upon them,
05:58Maximilian Schell's Captain Stransky. Stransky, a member of the German aristocracy,
06:04is desperate to win the eponymous award, the highest honour that could be bestowed upon a German
06:09soldier at the time, while Steiner and his men are all just trying to survive.
06:14Coburn and Schell are both excellent in the film, but it is the late David Warner who arguably leaves the
06:20longest lasting impression. Warner plays Captain Kiesel, a shell-shocked, disillusioned,
06:25Wehrmacht officer who'd long ago rubbished any notion of battlefield decorum or regulations.
06:31He plays only a bit-part role in the film, but his performance crystallises the one shed of hope
06:36it has for humanity – that a world without war could one day come from all this destruction.
06:42Cross of Iron is scathingly bleak, arguably Peckinpher's most unheralded work, and Warner forms a
06:49subtle pillar of it.
06:50Number 5 – Giovanni Ribisi – Saving Private Ryan
06:54While the majority of accolades associated with individual performances within Saving Private
06:59Ryan are usually bestowed upon leading man Tom Hanks, special praise must be reserved for Giovanni
07:05Ribisi's evocative bow as technician 4th grade Erwin Wade. A medic who survives the initial landing at
07:11Omaha Beach, Wade is responsible for several of the movie's most emotionally charged flashpoints.
07:17The segments in which Ribisi's soldier poignantly reflects his relationship with his mother,
07:21or his desperate attempts to rush to a mortally wounded Kapazo, never fail to tug on even the
07:26most iron of heartstrings. Wade's undisguised trauma underlines in brutal clarity just how far
07:32the combatants are from the comforts of home. And that's without even mentioning the medic's demise.
07:37Ribisi is so convincing as a dying young man terrified of his own mortality that his death is arguably the
07:43most desolating fatality throughout Saving Private Ryan.
07:47Number 4 – Lee Marvin – The Big Red One
07:50It should come as little surprise that Lee Marvin turns in one of the most authentic war movie
07:55performances of all time in Samuel Fuller's The Big Red One. One of the finest actors of his
08:00generation, Marvin served as a marine scout sniper in the Pacific Theatre during World War 2, earning
08:06several medals for gallantry. He was discharged after being wounded in action during the Battle of
08:10Saipan, an engagement that wiped out most of his company. Long story short, in terms of gritty
08:16authenticity and unwavering authority, Fuller, himself having served in the actual 1st Infantry
08:23Division in World War 2, couldn't have hoped for a better actor to play the unnamed sergeant
08:28in his 1980 epic. Marvin is magnificent in the role, somehow providing a restrained take on a character
08:35who has literally been sending young men to their deaths since the previous war, in 1914-1918.
08:41The sergeant is the glue that holds the film's central squad together. Marvin's Charge highlights
08:46the fact that true military camaraderie comes around as a result of competence, restraint,
08:51and a wary resignation to the horrors that soldiers find themselves faced with, as opposed to lengthy
08:56speeches about heroism and duty. Truly, one of the greatest to ever do it.
09:013. Melanie Laurent – Inglorious Bastards
09:05Quentin Tarantino's Inglorious Bastards saw Christoph Waltz turn in one of the most
09:10critically acclaimed performances of the last two decades. With the German-Austrian actor earning
09:15the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal of Hans Lander, while the finest war
09:20film bowels in recent memory often finds itself overshadowed. Simply put, Melanie Laurent is mesmerizing
09:27in her role as Shoshana Dreyfuss. A French-Jewish cinema owner who saw her entire family executed
09:33by Lander when she was 18 years old, Shoshana embarks on a campaign of retribution against Waltz's
09:39officer and the occupying German forces. Laurent is utterly believable as a hardened survivor and
09:45perpetrator of sadistic vengeance, while simultaneously lending staggering levels of legitimacy to the
09:51moments where her mask slips to reveal a traumatized and petrified young woman.
09:552. John Wayne – They Were Expendable
09:59John Wayne is one of the most legendary performers to ever exist. A symbol as much as he was an actor,
10:05Wayne forged a formidable partnership with director John Ford, starring in several westerns by the
10:10filmmaker, most famously the likes of Stagecoach, Ford Apache, and The Searchers. They also teamed up for a
10:16fantastic war film in 1945, one that was born from Ford's wartime experiences and resulted in one of
10:23the most pained and brilliant performances of Wayne's career. They Were Expendable starred Wayne opposite
10:30Robert Montgomery and depicted the Japanese invasion of the Philippines and the P.T. boats that helped
10:34defend off their advance. Montgomery was himself an actual P.T. boat commander during the Second World
10:41War, while Ford had contributed directly to the war effort working for the OSS. He was even
10:46wounded while filming the Japanese attack on Midway Island. Wayne, famously however, did not partake in
10:53World War 2. Partially due to medical issues, but it became a great source of shame for the actor,
10:58and it's something you can really feel in his performance in They Were Expendable.
11:02Ford was pretty ruthless to Wayne during shooting, even dressing down his actor in full view of the
11:08crew for not giving an accurate salute to the scene. And you can tell, because this isn't the
11:13swaggering, macho stereotype that would define many of Wayne's post-war roles. It's sad, anxious,
11:20almost withdrawn, and it perfectly reflects the nihilistic tone of the movie, which emphasises the
11:26human cost of the war in a way that feels pretty incongruous for the time. It won't be Ethan Edwards or
11:32Sheriff Chance for fame or acclaim, but secretly, Wayne's turn as Rusty Ryan in They Were Expendable is one of his
11:39greatest roles. 1. Christian Bale – Rescue Dawn
11:45Christian Bale possesses one of the most formidable resumes in modern Hollywood. The lorded actor is
11:49particularly recognised for his stunning versatility. Bale utterly throws himself into his roles,
11:55undergoing shocking physical transformations for his bowels and the likes of the Machinist and Vice.
12:00Bale's notoriously underappreciated turn in 2006's Rescue Dawn stands as a cinematic testament to the
12:07state of affairs. Taking on the role of real-life Vietnam War POW, Dieter Dengler, Bale's dedication
12:13to his craft within Werner Herzog's offering is genuinely breathtaking. Losing a significant amount
12:19of weight to lend authenticity to his portrayal of the emaciated Dengler, Bale produces a raw and
12:24emotionally charged performance of the highest calibre. And despite receiving widespread acclaim,
12:29Rescue Dawn was a box office bomb. Bale's performance was somehow completely overlooked by critics,
12:37a major accolade during the 2006 awards season. Not that it takes away from just how good a performance
12:43he gives. And those were 10 massively underrated war movie performances. Do you have any faves you
12:49think need more love and attention? Shout them out in the comments below and don't forget to drop the
12:53video a like if you enjoyed it and subscribe if you want more. Either way, I've been Ewan,
12:57this has been WarCulture and I'll hopefully catch you next time. Bye!