Superlative, multi-Oscar winning biography of T E Lawrence (Peter O'Toole), the Oxford-educated lieutenant who united Arab tribes against the Ottoman Turks in the First World War. While the story centres on the struggle of the unhinged anti-hero to help establish a united Arab nation, the vast, exquisitely composed desertscapes and breathtaking battle scenes equally linger in the audience's memory.

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With a budget of $25 million (making it one of the most expensive films to date at the time), this epic war story recreates the events that led to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, and the Americans' subsequent entry into World War II. Directors Fleischer, Fukasaku and Masuda give a spectacular, documentary-like account, told from both sides, of how key American personnel ignored warnings of possible Japanese aggression.

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A brutally powerful polemic from Oliver Stone based on the experiences of real-life journalist Richard Boyle, who found himself in a civil war in El Salvador in 1980. Stone hits hard at America's 'backyard' policies that allowed Central American dictatorships to flourish while death squads freely committed atrocities - Salvador features a powerful recreation of the assassination of Archbiship Romero and the sickening aftermath of the murder of several American nuns, committed with US approval.

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Coming at the Second World War from an unusual angle for an American movie, Sam Peckinpah's tale of Germans retreating from the Russian front is as intelligent as it is violent. Pekinpah concentrates his direction on the conflict between two German officers in a platoon making the dash for safety, but expands that to consider the importance of the individual against the necessity of everyone pulling together to survive. The cast (Max Schell, James Mason, James Coburn and David Warner) all play to the best of their ability - which is considerable - and it makes you wonder what Pekinpah could have achieved if he'd returned to warfare as a topic after this.

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Laurence Olivier's definitive screen version of Shakespeare's most patriotic work tells the story of the medieval English King's famous victory over the French on the battlefield of Agincourt. Remarkably, Olivier somehow fitted directing and producing duties around his sensational leading turn. So impressive is the extent of Olivier's overall contribution that, rather as with Welles in Citizen Kane, you almost forget how breathtaking his central performance is. The battle scenes are enough to stir the blood of even the calmest Englishman.

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