Eisenstein's celebrated documentary style re-creation of the 1905 anti-Tsarist uprising by Russian sailors is a meticulous exercise in montage, stirring visuals - and propaganda. Pretty much a 'set text' for today's film students, the film is most often remembered for its startling 'Odessa Steps' scene, the centrepiece of the work, and a breathtaking achievement.

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The best US film about the Afghan/Soviet conflict of the 1980s (though you'll always have a chance when Rambo III is the only competition) and a superior war film. A Soviet tank destroys an Afghan village but is trapped by Mujahadin rebels. Rowlands and his cast explore the shift of power and the claustrophobic terror of the crew quite beautifully. Jason Patric is terrific as a tank crewman with a conscience.

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A vision of French warfare during the First World War, this important movie was the biggest-grossing silent ($19 million) and established King Vidor as a major director. John Gilbert follows a German into a dug out only to find that his enemy is dying. He does not finish the job but comforts him. Around this key, humane scene, a more conventional portrait of war is constructed.

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Samuel Fuller's acclaimed Second World War tale of cameraderie and violence, starring Lee Marvin and a post-Star Wars Mark Hamill. The film chronicles the movements of a squad from the 1st US Infantry Division ('The Big Red One') through the World War II, from a beachhead assault in North Africa, through France, Sicily and Belgium, up to the horror of liberating a Nazi concentration camp. War is reduced to its graphic essentials in Fuller's no-holds-barred style and and Marvin brilliantly portrays the nameless battle-hardened sergeant leading the young Gis.

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Unarguably one of the most important films in the history of cinema, DW Griffith's sprawling historical epic is also one of the most controversial. The story, adapted from Thomas Dixon's overtly racist novel The Clansman, follows the fluctuating fortunes of two families - the Stonemasons in the North and the Camerons in the South - through the Civil War and Reconstruction until finally "the former enemies of North and South are united in common defence of their Aryan birthright." Technically brilliant, but appallingly misguided.

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