🏷 Discover The Best 1940s Movies & TV Shows To Watch Today

119 titles with this tag

The 1940s marked a pivotal golden era in cinema, defined by gripping film noir, sweeping wartime dramas, and unmatched Hollywood glamour. Despite global turmoil, filmmakers produced timeless masterpieces that reshaped storytelling forever. Step back in time and discover the best movies and TV shows set in or made during the iconic 1940s, offering incredible drama, romance, and history.

Cast

Ju00f8rgen Buckhu00f8j

Ghita Nu00f8rby

Holger Juul Hansen

Malene Schwartz

Matador (1978) TV Show

9.1 30 votes

Genre: Drama

Country: Denmark

Seasons: 4

Episodes: 24

Story: Matador is a Danish TV series produced and shown between 1978 and 1982. It is set in the fictional Danish town of Korsbæk between 1929 and 1947. It follows the lives of a range of characters from across the social spectrum, focusing specifically on the rivalry between the families of two businessmen: The banker Hans Christian Varnæs, an established local worthy, and social climber Mads Skjern, who arrives in town as the series opens. The name Matador was taken from the localised edition of the boardgame Monopoly, also the series' tentative English title. In addition, in contemporary Danish a "matador" is often used to describe a business tycoon, in the series referring to the character of Mads Skjern and his craftiness as a self-made entrepreneur.Directed by famed Danish film maker Erik Balling, Matador was the idea of author Lise Nørgaard who wrote the bulk of the episodes alongside Karen Smith, Jens Louis Petersen and Paul Hammerich. The series is one of the most well-known and popular examples of Danish television and represents the peak of longtime development of Danish TV drama by the public service channel Danmarks Radio.The series has become part of the modern self-understanding of Danes, partly because of its successful mix of melodrama and a distinct warm Danish humour in the depiction of characters, which were portrayed by a wide range of the most popular Danish actors at the time; but also not least because of its accurate portrayal of a turbulent Denmark from around the start of the Great Depression and through Nazi Germany's occupation of Denmark in World War II.

Plot: bourgeoisie, working class, business, historical fiction, resistance fighter, family saga, provincial life, german occupation of denmark

Time: 1940s, 1930s

Place: denmark

Cast

Tim Robbins

Morgan Freeman

Bob Gunton

William Sadler

The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

8.7 30.8K votes

Genre: Crime, Drama

Country: United States of America

Duration: 142 min.

Audience: R

Story: Imprisoned in the 1940s for the double murder of his wife and her lover, upstanding banker Andy Dufresne begins a new life at the Shawshank prison, where he puts his accounting skills to work for an amoral warden. During his long stretch in prison, Dufresne comes to be admired by the other inmates -- including an older prisoner named Red -- for his integrity and unquenchable sense of hope.

Style: epic

Plot: prison, friendship, police brutality, corruption, based on novel or book, freedom, hope, prison cell, ...

Time: 1940s

Cast

Marlon Brando

Al Pacino

James Caan

Robert Duvall

The Godfather (1972)

8.7 23.2K votes

Genre: Crime, Drama

Country: United States of America

Duration: 175 min.

Audience: R

Story: Spanning the years 1945 to 1955, a chronicle of the fictional Italian-American Corleone crime family. When organized crime family patriarch, Vito Corleone barely survives an attempt on his life, his youngest son, Michael steps in to take care of the would-be killers, launching a campaign of bloody revenge.

Plot: based on novel or book, loss of loved one, love at first sight, gangster, symbolism, patriarch, europe, organized crime, ...

Time: 1940s, 1950s

Place: italy

Cast

Michael Cudlitz

Rick Gomez

Scott Grimes

Damian Lewis

Band of Brothers (2001) TV Show

8.6 4.2K votes

Genre: Drama, War

Country: United States of America

Seasons: 1

Episodes: 10

Audience: TV-MA

Story: Drawn from interviews with survivors of Easy Company, as well as their journals and letters, Band of Brothers chronicles the experiences of these men from paratrooper training in Georgia through the end of the war. As an elite rifle company parachuting into Normandy early on D-Day morning, participants in the Battle of the Bulge, and witness to the horrors of war, the men of Easy knew extraordinary bravery and extraordinary fear - and became the stuff of legend. Based on Stephen E. Ambrose's acclaimed book of the same name.

Plot: based on novel or book, us army, paratroops, miniseries, historical, combat, historical drama, tank battle, ...

Time: world war ii, 1940s

Cast

Tom Hanks

Tom Sizemore

Edward Burns

Barry Pepper

Saving Private Ryan (1998)

8.2 17.4K votes

Genre: Drama, History, War

Country: United States of America

Duration: 169 min.

Audience: R

Story: 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.

Plot: dying and death, self sacrifice, bravery, duty, troops, waffen ss, omaha beach, rescue mission, ...

Time: world war ii, 1940s

Place: normandy, france

Cast

Volker Bruch

Tom Schilling

Katharina Schu00fcttler

Ludwig Trepte

Generation War (2013) TV Show

8.1 471 votes

Genre: Action, Drama, War

Country: Germany

Seasons: 1

Episodes: 3

Audience: TV-14

Story: Career-soldier Wilhelm, his pacifist younger brother Friedhelm, and their friends Charlotte, Viktor and Greta say farewell in the summer of 1941 in Berlin, with the promise to meet again after the war.

Plot: berlin, germany, nurse, soviet union, jew persecution, nazi, friends, aspiring singer, ...

Time: world war ii, 1940s

Cast

Ge You

Gong Li

Niu Ben

Guo Tao

To Live (1994)

8.1 382 votes

Genre: Drama, Romance, War

Country: China, Hong Kong

Duration: 133 min.

Story: Married couple Fugui and Jiazhen endure tumultuous events in mid-20th century mainland China as their personal fortunes move from wealthy landownership to peasantry.

Plot: child abuse, gambling, gambling debt, cultural revolution, chinese civil war, shadow puppet

Time: 1940s, 1950s, 1960s

Place: china

Cast

Ewan McGregor

David Bradley

Gregory Mann

Burn Gorman

Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio (2022)

8.0 3.4K votes

Genre: Adventure, Animation, Drama

Country: United States of America

Duration: 117 min.

Audience: PG

Story: During the rise of fascism in Mussolini's Italy, a wooden boy brought magically to life struggles to live up to his father's expectations.

Plot: based on novel or book, fascism, greed, woodcutter, musical, puppet, benito mussolini, stop motion, ...

Time: 1940s

Place: italy

Cast

Emily Blunt

8.0 12.0K votes

Genre: Drama, History

Country: United Kingdom, United States of America

Duration: 181 min.

Audience: R

Story: The story of J. Robert Oppenheimer's role in the development of the atomic bomb during World War II.

Plot: husband wife relationship, based on novel or book, atomic bomb, patriotism, new mexico, atomic bomb test, physics, biography, ...

Time: world war ii, 1940s, 20th century

Cast

Aldo Fabrizi

Marcello Pagliero

Harry Feist

Anna Magnani

Rome, Open City (1945)

8.0 981 votes

Genre: Drama, War

Country: Italy

Duration: 104 min.

Story: During the Nazi occupation of 1944 Rome, Resistance leader Giorgio Manfredi is pursued by the Nazis as he seeks refuge and a means of escape.

Plot: nazi, rome, italy, resistance, fascism, drug addiction, curfew, desertion, ...

Time: world war ii, 1940s

Cast

Roman Griffin Davis

Thomasin McKenzie

Scarlett Johansson

Taika Waititi

Jojo Rabbit (2019)

8.0 10.5K votes

Genre: Comedy, Drama, War

Country: New Zealand, United States of America

Duration: 108 min.

Audience: PG-13

Story: Jojo, a lonely German boy during World War II has his world shaken when he learns that his single mother is hiding a Jewish girl in their home. Influenced by a buffoonish imaginary version of Adolf Hitler, he begins to question his beliefs and confront the conflict between propaganda and his own humanity.

Style: satirical, irreverent

Plot: based on novel or book, jew persecution, satire, imaginary friend, hitler youth, single mother, questioning, nazism, ...

Time: world war ii, 1940s

Cast

Park Seo-jun

Han So-hee

Gyeongseong Creature (2023) TV Show

7.9 320 votes

Genre: Action, Drama, Mystery

Country: South Korea

Seasons: 2

Episodes: 17

Audience: TV-MA

Story: Gyeongseong, 1945. In Seoul's grim era under colonial rule, an entrepreneur and a sleuth fight for survival and face a monster born out of human greed.

Style: philosophical, satirical

Plot: monster, survival, hospital, japanese occupation of korea, dramatic, audacious, cliché

Time: 1940s

Cast

Bourvil

Louis de Funu00e8s

Terry-Thomas

Claudio Brook

Don't Look Now... We're Being Shot At! (1966)

7.9 1.5K votes

Genre: Comedy, War

Country: France, United Kingdom

Duration: 132 min.

Audience: G

Story: During World War II, two French civilians and a downed British Bomber Crew set out from Paris to cross the demarcation line between Nazi-occupied Northern France and the South. From there they will be able to escape to England. First, they must avoid German troops – and the consequences of their own blunders.

Plot: opera, paris, france, general, raf (royal air force), conductor, bomber, paratroops, ...

Time: world war ii, 1940s

Cast

Steve McQueen

James Garner

Richard Attenborough

James Donald

The Great Escape (1963)

7.9 2.9K votes

Genre: Adventure, Drama, War

Country: United States of America

Duration: 173 min.

Audience: NR

Story: The Nazis, exasperated at the number of escapes from their prison camps by a relatively small number of Allied prisoners, relocate them to a high-security 'escape-proof' camp to sit out the remainder of the war. Undaunted, the prisoners plan one of the most ambitious escape attempts of World War II. Based on a true story.

Plot: prison, uniform, swastika, prisoner, based on novel or book, nazi, escape, optimism, ...

Time: world war ii, 1940s

Place: switzerland

Cast

Non

Yoshimasa Hosoya

Natsuki Inaba

Minori Omi

In This Corner of the World (2016)

7.9 637 votes

Genre: Animation, Drama, History

Country: Japan

Duration: 130 min.

Audience: PG-13

Story: Japan, 1943, during World War II. Young Suzu leaves her village near Hiroshima to marry and live with her in-laws in Kure, a military harbor. Her creativity to overcome deprivation quickly makes her indispensable at home. Inhabited by an ancestral wisdom, Suzu impregnates the simple gestures of everyday life with poetry and beauty. The many hardships, the loss of loved ones, the frequent air raids of the enemy, nothing alters her enthusiasm…

Plot: husband wife relationship, hiroshima, japan, family relationships, romance, based on manga, adult animation, seinen, ...

Time: world war ii, 1940s, 1930s

Place: japan

Cast

Lino Ventura

Paul Meurisse

Jean-Pierre Cassel

Simone Signoret

Army of Shadows (1969)

7.9 755 votes

Genre: Drama, History, Thriller

Country: France, Italy

Duration: 145 min.

Audience: NR

Story: Betrayed by an informant, Philippe Gerbier finds himself trapped in a torturous Nazi prison camp. Though Gerbier escapes to rejoin the Resistance in occupied Marseilles, France, and exacts his revenge on the informant, he must continue a quiet, seemingly endless battle against the Nazis in an atmosphere of tension, paranoia and distrust.

Plot: czech, paris, france, based on novel or book, nazi, marseille, france, vichy regime, ...

Time: world war ii, 1940s

Cast

Amandla Stenberg

George MacKay

Abbie Cornish

Christopher Eccleston

Where Hands Touch (2018)

7.9 539 votes

Genre: Drama, Romance, War

Country: United Kingdom

Duration: 122 min.

Audience: PG-13

Story: Germany, 1944. Leyna, the 15-year old daughter of a white German mother and a black African father, meets Lutz, a compassionate member of the Hitler Youth whose father is a prominent Nazi soldier, and they form an unlikely connection in this quickly changing world.

Plot: nazi, jew persecution, hitler youth, coming of age, interracial romance, racism

Time: 1940s

Cast

Bruno Ganz

Alexandra Maria Lara

Corinna Harfouch

Ulrich Matthes

Downfall (2004)

7.9 4.4K votes

Genre: Drama, History, War

Country: Austria, Germany

Duration: 155 min.

Audience: R

Story: In April of 1945, Germany stands at the brink of defeat with the Russian Army closing in from the east and the Allied Expeditionary Force attacking from the west. In Berlin, capital of the Third Reich, Adolf Hitler proclaims that Germany will still achieve victory and orders his generals and advisers to fight to the last man. When the end finally does come, and Hitler lies dead by his own hand, what is left of his military must find a way to end the killing that is the Battle of Berlin, and lay down their arms in surrender.

Plot: dying and death, based on novel or book, nazi, clerk, dictator, poison, despair, traitor, ...

Time: world war ii, 1940s

Cast

Michael Kitchen

Honeysuckle Weeks

Foyle's War (2002) TV Show

7.9 108 votes

Genre: Crime, Drama, Mystery

Country: United Kingdom

Seasons: 9

Episodes: 28

Story: As WW2 rages around the world, DCS Foyle fights his own war on the home-front as he investigates crimes on the south coast of England. Foyle's War opens in southern England in the year 1940. Later series sees the retired detective working as an MI5 agent operating in the aftermath of the war.

Plot: police detective

Time: world war ii, 1940s

Cast

Ariella Glaser

Orlando Schwerdt

Bryce Gheisar

Gillian Anderson

White Bird (2023)

7.8 241 votes

Genre: Drama, War

Country: United States of America

Duration: 121 min.

Audience: PG-13

Story: After being expelled from Beecher Prep for his treatment of a classmate with a facial deformity, Julian has struggled to fit in at his new school. To transform his life, Julian's grandmother finally reveals her own story of courage of her youth in Nazi-occupied France, where a classmate shelters her from mortal danger.

Plot: nazi, holocaust (shoah), private school, bullying, hitler youth, coming of age, german occupation of france, kindness, ...

Time: world war ii, 1940s

Place: france

1 2 3 … 6 Next »

Uncovering the Magic of 1940s Cinema and WWII TV Dramas

From shadows cast in dark alleyways to emotional wartime farewells, the 1940s produced some of the most influential entertainment in history. Whether you are seeking authentic classic films or modern television shows capturing WWII-era grit, this decade offers unforgettable visual storytelling.

Essential 1940s Film Masterpieces

Classic Hollywood experienced a creative peak, introducing techniques and narrative styles that still inspire modern directors today.

Casablanca (1942): The ultimate romantic wartime drama featuring Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman.
Citizen Kane (1941): Orson Welles’ groundbreaking cinematic triumph, frequently hailed as the greatest film ever made.
The Maltese Falcon (1941): The quintessential hard-boiled film noir that defined detective mysteries.
It’s a Wonderful Life (1946): Frank Capra’s heart-warming holiday classic celebrating human connection.

Top Modern TV Series Set in the 1940s

Modern television frequently revisits the 1940s to explore World War II, post-war reconstruction, and mid-century culture with incredible detail.

Band of Brothers: An immersive HBO miniseries detailing the harrowing experiences of Easy Company during WWII.
The Pacific: A visceral exploration of the WWII Pacific Theater through the eyes of brave U.S. Marines.
Marvel's Agent Carter: A stylish action-drama capturing post-war espionage, crime, and vintage aesthetics.
Foyle’s War: A captivating British mystery series exploring crime on the English home front during wartime.

Why 1940s Entertainment Captivates Audiences Today

The enduring popularity of 1940s media stems from its raw emotional power, memorable sharp dialogue, and complex moral themes. It was a decade of intense conflict and resilience, producing stories that continue to resonate across generations of film lovers.