The 40 most popular swedish war movies, ranked. Click any film for ratings, reviews, trailers, and where to watch.


Shame
1968 · 1h 44m · SE
In the midst of a civil war, a pair of former violinists in a tempestuous marriage oversee a farm on a rural island. In spite of their best efforts to escape their homeland, the war impinges on every aspect of their lives.


Their Finest
2017 · 1h 57m · FR
During the Blitz of World War II, a female screenwriter works on a film celebrating England's resilience as a way to buoy a weary populace's spirits. Her efforts to dramatise the true story of two sisters who undertook their own maritime mission to rescue wounded soldiers are met with mixed feelings by a dismissive all-male staff.


The Swedish Connection
2026 · 1h 42m · SE
Swedish Foreign Ministry bureaucrat Gösta Engzell, overlooked during WWII, rescued thousands while turning supposedly neutral Sweden into a moral force. His efforts challenged the status quo and left a lasting humanitarian legacy.


The First Squadron
1941 · 1h 32m · SE
The year is 1941 and Nazi Germany is at its peak. Hitler's army is storming into Russia. Sweden stands lonely and isolated while the air force is training intensely due to a coming attack. The squadron leader pushes his men at its hardest. It's a constant game with death where death unfortunately often wins.


Stockholm Bloodbath
2024 · 2h 25m · DK
In 1520, the notorious and power-hungry Danish King Christian II is determined to seize the Swedish crown from Sten Sture, no matter what it takes. Meanwhile, sisters Freja and Anne make a solemn promise to seek revenge on the men who brutally murdered their family. Everything comes to a head in the heart of Stockholm, where the sisters are drawn into a ruthless political struggle between Sweden and Denmark that culminates in a mass execution, presided over by the mad King "Christian the Tyrant," known as the Stockholm Bloodbath.


Armadillo
2010 · 1h 45m · DK
Danish soldiers are sent to Afghanistan in 2009 for 6 months, to help stabilize the country against the Taliban. They're stationed on Armadillo military base in Helman province. Unlike other war movies, this is the real deal – no actors.


The Last Inhabitant
2016 · 1h 22m · AM
In an Armenian village, evicted as a result of the Armenian-Azeri conflict, Abgar stays behind all alone in a gradually shrinking enemy ring. He is waiting for his daughter, who became a witness to her husband's murder by an angry mob and was hospitalized with a mental disorder. An Azeri named Ibrahim offers Abgar to work on the construction of a mosque and promises to find and bring Abgar's daughter instead... A few days later, Ibrahim finds the girl, named Yurga, in one of the psychiatric hospitals of Baku and brings her to Abgar. Abgar wants to leave the village with his daughter, but his skills as a stonemason are still needed for the construction of a new mosque. Abgar realizes that this work in the Azerbaijani village will be endless and realizes that he's been trapped.


Beyond the Border
2011 · 2h 2m · SE
December 1942. Two young soldiers leave their posts at checkpoint 83 in North Värmland, Sweden and make their way through the ice cold winter night towards the Nazi-occupied Norwegian border. Sweden stands on the brink of invasion and they want to see the enemy everybody's talking about. But the adventure ends in disaster and soon thereafter Lieutenant Aron Stenström finds out that his brother Sven is one of the missing soldiers. With the odds stacked against him he is forced to go behind enemy lines on a secret rescue mission. Deep inside the Norwegian forests Aron realizes that a completely different kind of line must be crossed if they're to come out alive.


Johan Ulfstjerna
1923 · 1h 7m · SE
The story of a man who makes a great sacrifice for his country and for his son. Based on the play of the same title by Tor Hedberg.


Betrayed
2020 · 2h 6m · NO
During World War II, millions of Jews from all over Europe are deported and killed in German concentration camps. When the German troops invade Norway, the Norwegian Jews feel safe and protected. But anti-Semitism knows no borders and as the war escalates in Europe, the situation changes drastically. Suddenly, their radios are taken away; their passports are stamped with a big J and one day, all the men men over the age of 15 are arrested and taken to prisons camps. Many of the women left behind are too frightened to escape and are desperately waiting for their husbands and sons to come back home. On November 26, 1942, hundreds of Jews are picked up by the police in the middle of the night and are transported to the dock in Oslo. Unknowing and frightened men, women, children, sick and old are forced on board the awaiting German cargo ship "SS DONAU". The ship leaves with 532 Norwegian Jews onboard; 302 men, 188 women and 42 children. The end station is Auschwitz.


The Gladiators
1969 · 1h 32m · SE
Some time in the future, East and West have stopped maintaining standing armies and nuclear weapons. Instead, to settle their differences they pit different teams of crack combat specialists against each other.


The Bread of Love
1953 · 1h 30m · SE
Four Swedish volunteer soldiers are trapped in Russia. In front of them lies the front with enemy outposts and patrols, behind them the enemy minefields. Hope to return to their own lines decreases each day. Corpses of fallen, "dead of cold and hard as iron", forms the macabre landmarks in the winter landscape. Nearby is a burnt Russian village.


The Great John Ericsson
1937 · 1h 33m · SE
In 1803 the Swedish inventor John Ericsson is born. After a military career he went to England and became one of the first builders of locomotives. Despite large debts, he invents the propeller. In 1839 he crosses the Atlantic and builds ships for the US Navy. When the US civil war breaks out, the Federation needs a ship to match the Confederate 'Merrimac' and preventing the Confederation from exporting cotton to Europe. Ericsson builds the 'Monitor', a ship the Federation needs to win the war.


Med folket för fosterlandet
1938 · 1h 46m · SE
This film depicts every noteworthy event (in the eyes of the film-makers) in Sweden from the death of King Oscar II, in 1907, to the celebration of the 80th birthday of King Gustave V in Stockholm in June of 1938. This film is comprised largely of newsreel clips intermixed with the fictional story of the family lives of a working man and a well-to-do newspaper editor through two generations, with a special significance in the showing of the development of the social-democratic form of government in Sweden.


General von Döbeln
1942 · 1h 27m · SE
1813. The Swedish army is fighting in the War of the Sixth Coalition. The popular general Von Döbeln is arrested for sending the army against the French in breach of orders by the crown prince. At the court martial he is sentenced to death but is pardoned by the king and sent to prison instead. A group of conspirators are planning to set him free and make him their leader in a coup d'etat.
One Christmas Morning
One Christmas Morning
2002 · 10m · SE
A lone Finnish soldier meets a lone Russian soldier at the border.


For Hearth and Home
1917 · 33m · SE
Sweden's only war film during World War I.


Farha
2021 · 1h 32m · JO
Palestine, 1948. After the withdrawal of the British occupiers, tensions rise between Arabs and Jews. Meanwhile, Farha, the smart daughter of the mayor of a small village, unaware of the coming tragedy, dreams of going to study in the big city.


The Distant Barking of Dogs
2017 · 1h 31m · DK
Hnutove, Donbass, eastern Ukraine, 2015. Young Oleg lives in a war zone where anti-aircraft gunshots and missile attacks often resonate dangerously near. Although many inhabitants have already left this dangerous area, he remains with his grandmother, who has cared for him since his mother's death, because they have nowhere to go. They are just waiting for the war to end.


1939
1989 · 3h 13m · SE
When the war breaks out, Annika lives with her parents in Värmland, close to the border to Norway. Her cousin Harald is a dealer in the black market but has to escape from the police to Norway. Annika moves to Stockholm and gets a job as a waitress. She meets the happy-go-lucky Berit and together they have a wonderful time. She also meets a young man, Bengt, whom she marries. But almost immediately she discovers that her husband is different from the man who was courting her. Plot by Mattias Thuresson.


An Enemy to Die For
2012 · 1h 46m · NO
Despite the threat of war in the fall of 1939, the Germans decide to launch a sea expedition in search of evidence for Pangaea. Although the multi national geologists embark enthusiastically on their research mission, the growing political tension between their countries soon affects their work. With Britain and France declaring war on Germany, the civilian scientists now find themselves mere pawns in a global power struggle.


Raoul's Boyz of Budapest
2018 · 3h · CH
During his half year in Budapest Raoul devoted everything to his true self. He has lost borders, he has gained courage and created devoted team; together they achieved the impossible. They became few of the few to error the final solution.


Good Evening, Mr. Wallenberg
1990 · 1h 58m · HU
Swedish account of Raoul Wallenberg, the man responsible for the largest rescue of Jews during World War II.


Vi mötte stormen
1943 · 1h 17m · SE
News reel film sequences from September 1938 until the end of 1942, integrated with the fictive Swedish family Söderberg in their everyday life at home and the changes, because of the escalating war, that are brought upon them.


A Day Will Dawn
1944 · 1h 35m · SE
After finding his wife in the arms of another man, an army officer kills his rival and then goes by train to Finland to fight in the Winter war.


Gustaf Wasa, Part One
1928 · 1h 43m · SE
The story takes its beginning in 1518 , the Danish King Christian II has taken Sweden. Sten Sture the younger appeal to all loyal subjects to resist. The offer reaches the farmer Mats Waltersson in Dalarna , Sweden's heart and he gathers his men. Dalmas were going from house to house, they do not want a Dane on the throne. At Brännkyrka outside Stockholm is a battle between the Danes and Swedes. Swedes win and the Swedish riksbaneret out during the Battle of Gustav Eriksson Vasa.


En vår i vapen
1943 · 1h 23m · SE
During the spring of 1940 two young men gets drafted and deployed close to the Norwegian border, where they fall in love with the same woman.


There's a Fire Burning
1943 · 1h 47m · SE
An allegory of Germany's WWII occupation of Norway. Members of a theater ensemble join the resistance.


Kalabaliken i Bender
1983 · 1h 37m · SE
The famous Swedish Karoliner army has suffered its biggest defeat ever at Poltava in 1709. The Swedish king Karl XII is waiting in the small village of Bender for the Turkish sulton to help him defeat his arch enemy, the czar of Russia, Peter the Great. But the Turks think he's an expensive guest and want him out of Turkey. However, he refuses. The sultan then decides to send Karl XII a princess to marry him, to get him out of the country (a bride for a bribe). The two Swedish soldiers Lagercrona and Kruus are to escort the princess. They experience many different adventures on their way to Bender, namely because other Swedish soldiers and agents try to stop them from ever reaching the village, because they don't want Karl XII to leave Turkey. After their long adventure to get there and a few misunderstandings, the famous "kalabalik" of Bender, where the Turks decide to drive Karl XII out of Turkey by force, begins.


They Staked Their Lives
1940 · 1h 26m · SE
"With life at stake"- Max is illegal arms dealers and lives with Wanda, a spy for the dictatorship in which they live. She is ordered by her superiors to reveal the actions and members resistance group. The freedom fighter John falls in love with Wanda.
Gustaf Wasa, Part Two
Gustaf Wasa, Part Two
1928 · 1h 51m · SE
King Christian II rides busy street by Sweden which he now put under him, while he remembers what he did against the Swedes at the Stockholm Bloodbath. In dala heels walk a lonely man, dressed as a peasant. It's the one the Danes would prefer to get hold of - Gustaf Eriksson Vasa . He goes from Rankhyttan to Ornäs , where he is kindly received by the farmer Arendt Persson, but Arendt is a deceitful man who has thought enter Wasa to the Danish bailiff. But Arendt's wife helps Wasa to escape and he continues his long journey.


Karl XII
1974 · 1h 47m · SE
August Strindberg's historical play about the king he called Sweden's traitor.


The Invisible Wall
1944 · 1h 45m · SE
In an unnamed country under occupation, a senior officer is killed in an attack by a member of the resistance.


A Bit of a Stranger
2024 · 1h 30m · DE
Svitlana, a Russian-speaking Ukrainian, examines the colonised part of her consciousness and tries to find answers to the question of how Soviet totalitarianism and Russification influenced the relationships within her family.


The Tales of Ensign Stål
1926 · 3h 4m · SE
Based on the poems by finnish poet Johan Ludvig Runeberg, the movie centers on the Finnish War between Russia and Sweden in 1808.
Mannen utan själ
Mannen utan själ
1983 · 1h 30m · SE
A mystery game of light and shadow. The shadows seal around the army's. It is the men of the two extreme parties who shoot at each other, spreading destruction and death.


Preparing For War
2026 · DK
No overview available


Frihetsligan
1994 · 1h 25m
Filmed in post-war Beirut, Leyla Assaf-Tengroth's "Frihetsligan" proposes a trajectory around the city guided by an unusual little girl, hustling to find her bearings in a place that appears both hostile and inspiring.


Assignment in Korea
1951 · 1h 23m · SE
Swedish journalist visits Korea to report on the situation during the war


En kvinna ombord
1941 · 1h 29m · SE
In the beginning of WW II a Swedish ship in a northern French port is exposed to German air raids. The captain take a chance to leave the port without permission. A stranded woman seize the chance to get home to Sweden.
Swedish cinema is inseparable from Ingmar Bergman, whose chamber dramas set an international benchmark for psychological seriousness. The country also anchors the Nordic noir tradition that reshaped European crime storytelling.
War films range from combat spectacle to anti-war argument, and often try to be both at once. The genre is a reliable index of how a country understands its own history.