Tom,

Bloody Sunday is a must - up there with Battle of Algiers. Question - do you see the IRA provoking the para's? Friends and I had big debate about this.

Paradise Now - very potent on suicide bombing.

Diameter of the bomb (doco).

Team America - brilliant funny take on destroying the village to save it mentality of US adventurism and the soft hollywood bellyaching that follows in its wake.

Arlington Road - Im surprised it didnt get more attention. More of a thriller than a serious insight into terrorism but I'd list it.

Die Hard 1-27 (OK Im kidding!).

Cheers from sunny FL

Here are two of my favorites:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpoudLoc8sY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ruNrdmjcNTc

John Malkovich's The Dancer Upstairs is a underappreciated movie about the nexus between police work and counterinsurgency and an overall a pretty good film. It's a movie about how Abimael Guzman was captured in 1992 and the decline of Sendero Luminoso. The movie has two egregious flaws -- Spanish actors speaking English in a South American setting and a bad sub-romance -- but offers otherwise really cool action scenes.

Happy Holidays, Tom and thank you for your great website.

I have been reading your blog for last 2 months now and have found it very informative.

I got Bloody Sunday from my library. Will watch it over the weekend. Agree with Battle of Algiers. Good movie.

Given the number of terrorist attacks in India, there is a huge market for terrorism/terrorist themed movies. Being indian movies, they are long (2+ hours) and only some of them have song dance sequences. :)

1. Terrorist - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0169302/ - About a female suicide bomber before her last mission - Based loosely on Dhanu, the female suicide bomber who took out Indian PM Rajiv Gandhi in 1991 - No song/dance stuff which makes it tedious to watch

2. A wednesday - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Wednesday! - More about effects of constant terrorist attacks on indian society than about terrorism itself. Very well made movie - Doesnt have song/dance stuff either but moves at a good pace so is not boring

3. Black Friday - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0400234/ - A movie about police investigation of bomb blasts in mumbai in 1993 - Very well made - No song/dance stuff but is gripping enough to make me overlook lack of song/dances

4. Roja (Rose) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roja - The granddaddy of terrorist themed movies in India - The first movie that treated terrorists as serious people (prior to that, you could identify terrorists in indian movies by their decibels - They were the ones with loudest voice) - Has songs, dances, improbable fights

5. Kurudhi Punal (River of blood) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuruthipunal - About how 2 police officers respond to terrorism in different ways and how ideals can get easily thrown aside - Ending is kind of melodramatic - No song/dances

I am sure I can come up with more movies given the number of terrorist attacks in India every year.

Its by James Cameron....

Two films suitable for comparing in a film class -

Paradise Now: a necessary bit of humanization and a change in viewpoint from the usual. Not in my comedy section, but one scene involving a martyr video and lunch produced chuckles.

And Team America of course. American anti-terrorism foreign policy simplified, caricatured and packaged hiliously in a film both marionette artists and non-IR specialists can understand.

And now I need to visit the video store to pick up the many on this list I have not yet seen. Call it professional development - I'll have to work on getting credit for it though.

Always interesting site - even the inevitable lists.

Might we include the "LIttle Drummer Girl?"

Surely there are more good films about terrorism.

You mean besides Die Hard and The Sum of All Fears?

Very few of the "Top Ten" films about terrorism (or anything else!) will be self-described as "about terrorism", but contain some insight or realistic portrayal of this subject.

This would include the important filmsThe Birth of a Nation (aka The Clansmen—string up those carpetbaggers and misogynatin' renegade slaves!) and Seven Samurai, and The Ten Commandments (terrorism by frogs, and the more-traditional fire falling from the sky and blood-poisoned water). For surrealist films, Buñuel's trilogy including That Obscure Object of Desire and The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie—perhaps the only film to win an Oscar in this category besides The Ten Commandments. Not in the same league but also worthwhile is V for Vendetta. And not a film, but an excellent, even-handed documentary, The War of Lebanon from Al Jazeera.

According to Wikipedia, THRUSHmay have stood for Technological Hierarchy for the Removal of Undesirables and the Subjugation of Humanity, run by a Col. Moran after the death of Professor Moriarty (note the British anti-Irish bias; all the bad guys are Irish - see my post about Bloody Sunday above).

;-)

Battle of Algiers has got to be on the top of the list.

I'd say The Siege is a good addition, at least worth a watch. It's about terror cells in NY and how our society would react to such attacks.

It might be a stretch for the terrorism genre, but I thought Body of Lies, which came out semi-recently, was pretty good. Based on a book by David Ignatius. That guy knows clandestine services and the Middle East just about as well as anyone I can think of.

It's a late James Cagney picture, set in Ireland during the Troubles, and covers a lot of the same ground as "Collins" and "Wind." In addition to the stock action scenes, such as a grenade rolled under an armored car, the plot involves a kidnapping and threats of reprisal.

Somewhat akin to "Algiers" is "Lion of the Desert" about the Libyan revolt led by Omar Mukhtar against the Mussolini occupation. The Italians see the Libyans as terrorists, of course.

There's one very good line, where an underling wants to torture and kill and Italian prisoner because the Italians torture and kill Arab prisoners. Replies Mukhtar (Anthony Quinn): "They are not our teachers."

Great movie about the international war criminal and terrorist Bush. The film shows how a loser drunk turns to religious fanaticism in order to terrorize the world. Five Stars.

Great film about how people in the Southern United States terrorized the African American population for decades. Five Stars.

This film inverts standard thinking by showing how American high school students, in response to foreign occupation, could turn into something resembling the Taliban. It's more about counterinsurgency then terrorism, but it's entertaining.

An Academy Award winning documentary about the massacre at the 1972 Munich Olympics, One Day in September is a must-add. Where Munich interlaced the events at the Munich Olympics with the Israeli response as described in George Jonas' book Vengeance, One Day in September is a chronicle of what occurred in Munich. Michael Douglas narrates a story told with actual film footage (no re-enactments) and interviews with people who were there. Adding to the historical value is the perspective of the one surviving terrorist who was not killed by the Israelis and was interviewed by the filmmaker.

An interesting documentary about an American 60's radical group that went from a group of war protestors, to radical war protestor, to domestic terrorism. Its interesting in that it shows the progression from ideology to progressively more radical ideology and isolation to actual acts of violence and eventually terrorism (bombing the Pentagon, killing a federal judge). It is more interesting in that all this occurs in the US, in a culture we understand, whose history we are familiar with (as much as a GEN X'er like myself can understand the 60s). Raises interesting questions about civil liberties and domestic intelligence, as well.

I cannot believe that no one has mentioned Operation Thunderbolt a.k.a The Raid on Entebbe, which was led by the older brother of today's prime minister of Israel. Absolute classic! If you have not seen it, it is a must! http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076398/

Sadly I don't think many would want to watch the Battle for Algiers. It's black and white, subtitled, and isn't simple. Most American audiences can barely stand one of those things, let alone all three.