Memorial Day 2025: Where to Watch Classic War Movie Marathons
On, and leading up to, Memorial Day 2025 (Monday, May 26, 2025) a few networks are recognizing the holiday with lineups of classic military- and war-themed movies.
Notable Memorial Day-themed films airing on Turner Classic Movies (TCM), the MOVIES! network and AMC are listed below, divided by network, beginning with TCM, which has movies airing for several days around the holiday.
MEMORIAL DAY 2025 MOVIE MARATHONS (BY NETWORK; ALL TIMES EASTERN)
TURNER CLASSIC MOVIES (TCM)
Friday, May 23, 2025
Starting this evening and continuing into the early morning of Tuesday, May 27, Turner Classic Movies celebrates Memorial Day with a nonstop lineup of war- and military-themed films. Here, in order, are the films they will be airing over the next three-plus days:
8pm: The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) — This drama about World War II veterans readjusting to life back home earned William Wyler a Best Director Oscar along with wins for Best Picture, Best Actor (Fredric March) and Best Supporting Actor (Harold Russell). Russell was an actual war veteran who had lost both hands during his service; prior to this production, he had been recruited to be in a short 1945 documentary film about disabled veterans, called Diary of a Sergeant, designed to inspire wounded soldiers returning from war. That film led to Russell’s casting in Best Years. Dana Andrews, Myrna Loy, Teresa Wright and Virginia Mayo costar.
11pm: Till the End of Time (1946) — This drama, released a a few months before The Best Years of Our Lives, deals with the similar theme of World War II vets, in this case, three Marines, readjusting to civilian life. Robert Mitchum, Dorothy McGuire, Guy Madison and Bill Williams star.
Saturday, May 24, 2025
1am: Pride of the Marines (1945) — This biographical war film tells the story of Marine Sergeant Al Schmid (portrayed by John Garfield), his heroic stand against a Japanese attack during the Battle of Guadalcanal and his subsequent rehabilitation. Eleanor Parker costars.
3:15am: Battle Cry (1955) — Raoul Walsh directed this film based on the novel by former Marine Leon Uris, who adapted the screenplay, which follows Marine Corps recruits from boot camp to battles in the Pacific. Van Heflin, Aldo Ray, James Whitmore, Tab Hunter and Nancy Olson lead the cast.
5:45am: Marines in the Making (1942) — This Oscar-nominated short propaganda documentary highlights U.S. Marine Corps combat training methods during the first year of World War II.
6am: Wings for the Eagle (1942) — This drama follows workers at an aircraft assembly plant in the months leading up to the attack on Pearl Harbor. Ann Sheridan, Dennis Morgan and Jack Carson star.
7:30am: Mister Roberts (1955) — Henry Fonda re-created his Broadway stage role in this Best Picture Oscar-nominated comedy/drama about the dehumanizing aspects of war. Onboard a supply ship in the Pacific theater during the waning days of World War II, cargo officer Doug Roberts (Fonda) longs for combat duty, but in the meantime serves as a buffer between the men and their tyrannical captain (James Cagney). The terrific cast also includes William Powell, in his final film appearance, as the ship’s doctor and Best Supporting Actor Oscar winner Jack Lemmon as Ensign Pulver, who would later be played by Robert Walker Jr. in a 1964 sequel named after the character. (Note: the video below contains spoilers if you haven’t seen the film!)
9:45am: Sergeant York (1941) — Gary Cooper earned a Best Actor Oscar for his performance in the title role of this film, based on the true story of Alvin C. York (adapted from his diary), one of the most-decorated American soldiers of World War I. The film also won an Oscar for its editing, and was nominated in nine other categories, including Best Picture, Best Director (Howard Hawks) and Best Original Score (Max Steiner).
Courtesy Everett Collection
George Tobias, Gary Cooper and Joe Sawyer in Sergeant York
12pm: Hit the Deck (1955) — Airing as part of TCM’s Musical Matinee block, this musical follows three sailors who come ashore and try to win the hearts of three women. The cast features Jane Powell, Tony Martin, Debbie Reynolds, Walter Pidgeon, Vic Damone, Ann Miller and Russ Tamblyn.
2pm: Men Must Fight (1933) — Drama about a woman who, after her lover is killed in World War I, raises their son as a pacifist. But in the rather prescient story’s setting — a then far-off 1940 — as a second war looms between the U.S. and what is referred to as the “Eurasian States,” that belief is put to the test.
3:15pm: Men of the Fighting Lady (1954) — This Korean War-set drama is led by Van Johnson and Walter Pidgeon.
4:45pm: Target Zero (1955) — Also set during the Korean War, this film’s cast features Richard Conte, Charles Bronson and Chuck Connors.
6:30pm: The Steel Helmet (1951, pictured below) — This film from writer/director Samuel Fuller was the first American movie about the Korean conflict, produced while it was still going on.
Courtesy Everett Collection
8pm: Men in War (1957) — Another notable production about the Korean War, this one from director Anthony Mann, and with a cast including Robert Ryan and Aldo Ray.
9:45pm: A Walk in the Sun (1945) — Dana Andrews, Richard Conte, Lloyd Bridges and Sterling Holloway lead the cast in this film from director Lewis Milestone that follows a platoon of soldiers during the Allied invasion of Italy in World War II.
Sunday, May 25, 2025
12am: Cornered (1945) — Airing as part of Noir Alley, this film noir set just after the end of World War II stars Dick Powell as Canadian pilot and former POW who returns to France to discover who ordered the murder of his new bride, a member of the French Resistance.
2am: Battleground (1949) — Best Director nominee William A. Wellman helmed this Best Picture-nominated film that dramatizes real-life events of the 327th Glider Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division being trapped in the besieged city of Bastogne, Belgium, during the Battle of the Bulge in World War II. Van Johnson, John Hodiak, Ricardo Montalbán and Best Supporting Actor nominee James Whitmore star.
4:15am: Armored Command (1961) — Making its TCM premiere is this drama set at the height of the Ardennes offensive, near the beginning of the Battle of the Bulge. Howard Keel, Tina Louise, Earl Holliman and Burt Reynolds in an early role star.
6am: Ace of Aces (1933) — This drama follows a pacifist who has no interest in joining the military as the U.S. enters World War I. After his girlfriend mocks him, he enlists and becomes a fighter pilot and under goes a complete personality change into a warmonger. Richard Dix, Elizabeth Allan and Ralph Bellamy star.
7:45am: Air Force (1943) — Howard Hawks directed this film set in the Pacific theater of World War II and made during the conflict. John Garfield, John Ridgely and Gig Young star.
10am: Cornered (1945) — A re-airing of last night’s Noir Alley feature.
12pm: A Farewell to Arms (1932) — This first film based on Ernest Hemingway’s classic and tragic (and semiautobiographical) novel of the same name about a wartime romance was made in 1932, just three years after the book’s publication. Stationed in Italy during World War I, American ambulance driver Frederic Henry (Gary Cooper) falls in love with British nurse Catherine Barkley (Helen Hayes). While the pair swears oaths of eternal love, the horrors of war threaten to destroy their beautiful relationship. Adolphe Menjou and Jack La Rue costar in this Best Picture-nominated film that was made pre-Code and therefore has some themes and scenes that over the past 90 years have been cut and restored at various times and with various sensibilities.
1:45pm: Fighter Squadron (1948) — Another war film from director Raoul Walsh, this one is set at an American air base in England in 1943, and features Edmond O’Brien and Robert Stack (pictured below) among its cast.
Courtesy Everett Collection
3:30pm: Merrill’s Marauders (1962) — Samuel Fuller cowrote and directed this film based on the exploits of the titular group — the long range penetration special ops jungle warfare unit officially named the 5307th Composite Unit (Provisional), led by Brigadier General Frank Merrill — during the World War II Burma campaign, culminating in the Siege of Myitkyina. Jeff Chandler headlines the cast
5:15pm: Take the High Ground! (1953) — Richard Brooks directed this drama starring Richard Widmark and Karl Malden as drill sergeants who must turn everyday civilians into soldiers during the Korean War.
7pm: The Memphis Belle: A Story of a Flying Fortress (1944) — Director William Wyler’s documentary about the last World War II mission of the titular plane.
8pm: The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) — David Lean’s incredibly gripping 1957 Best Picture Oscar-winning World War II adventure epic stars Alec Guinness as Col. Nicholson, a British officer who is among the British troops being held in a Japanese POW camp in Burma. He and his men are forced by their captors to construct a railroad bridge; not only do they accomplish the task, but the misguidedly duty-bound Nicholson is also proud of the final result, despite its implications for further Japanese expansion in the war and future allegations of collaborating with the enemy. He believes their construction will outlive the conflict and remain a testament to the British army’s ingenuity.
Meanwhile, unbeknownst to the POWs, escaped American sailor Cmdr. Shears (William Holden) is on his way back, leading a British commando team on a mission to destroy the bridge. This legendary adaptation of Pierre Boulle’s novel won six other Oscars out of the eight for which it was nominated, including Best Actor for Guinness and Best Director for Lean. Sessue Hayakawa costars in a Best Supporting Actor-nominated performance as the prison camp’s commandant, Col. Saito, and brings nuance and humanity to what might have been a more stereotypical bad guy character in a lesser war film of the era.
11pm: The Red Badge of Courage (1951) — Cowriter/director John Huston’s adaptation of Stephen Crane’s 1895 Civil War-set novel, led by World War II hero-turned-actor Audie Murphy (pictured below).
Courtesy Everett Collection
Monday, May 26, 2025 (Memorial Day)
12:15am: Shoulder Arms (1918) and A Sailor Made Man (1921) — Both of these silent comedies are airing as part of the Silent Sunday block. Shoulder Arms, running just under 40 minutes, was directed by Charlie Chaplin, who stars as a Doughboy in France during World War I. A Sailor-Made Man, running just under 50 minutes, stars Harold Lloyd as a guy who joins the Navy to impress a girl.
2am: The Mirror (1975) — An experimental Soviet film cowritten and directed by Andrei Tarkovsky, airing as part of the Imports block.
4am: A Generation (1955) — Also airing as part of the Imports block, this Polish film directed by Andrzej Wajda was the first of his “Three War Films” trilogy set during World War II.
6am: Report From the Aleutians (1943) — John Huston directed and narrated this Oscar-nominated documentary produced by the U.S. Army Signal Corps about the Aleutian Islands Campaign during World War II.
7am: Go for Broke! (1951) — This dramatization of the real-life 442nd Regimental Combat Team, a segregated unit that was made up of Nisei (second-generation Americans born of Japanese parents) soldiers who fought in World War II, is led by Van Johnson and costars several actual veterans of the 442nd, including Ken Okamoto, pictured in the far left of the photo below, and George Miki, pictured on the far right.
Courtesy Everett Collection
8:45am: Flying Leathernecks (1951) — John Wayne and Robert Ryan headline this film from director Nicholas Ray about the combat exploits and personal battles among Marine Corps aviators in World War II.
10:30am: Destination Tokyo (1943) — Influencing submarine-set war films to come in later decades, this suspenseful classic led by Cary Grant and John Garfield follows the crew of a U.S. sub who most sneak into Tokyo Bay and place a spy team ashore in order to get info for the first air raid over Tokyo in World War II.
1pm: The Story of G.I. Joe (1945) — This World War II drama earned costar Robert Mitchum a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination. Director William A. Wellman’s film concentrates on C Company, 18th Infantry, and their combat in Tunisia and Italy, as related through the reporting of famed war correspondent Ernie Pyle (the word from Pyle’s columns are narrated by Burgess Meredith).
3pm: Darby’s Rangers (1958) — James Garner leads this World War II film as William Orlando Darby, the founding commander of the First Ranger Battalion, which evolved into the United States Army Rangers. Darby was was killed in action in Italy at age 34 and posthumously promoted to Brigadier General.
5:15pm: Where Eagles Dare (1968) — Richard Burton, Clint Eastwood and Mary Ure lead this terrific World War II-set adventure film about a special ops team assigned to save a captured American general from a remote Nazi fortress high in the Alps.
8pm: The Great Escape (1963) — This iconic, Best Picture-nominated film based on a real-life escape by Allied prisoners from a World War II German POW camp was directed by John Sturges, and features a cast led by Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard Attenborough, Charles Bronson, Donald Pleasence and James Coburn. And, of course, there is also that classic musical theme by Elmer Bernstein:
11pm: The Dirty Dozen (1967) — Director Robert Aldrich’s wartime action classic about an officer (Lee Marvin) charged with turning 12 convicts into commandos for a daring raid to wipe out a gathering of top Nazi brass. The cast also includes Ernest Borgnine, Charles Bronson, Jim Brown, Richard Jaeckel, George Kennedy, Telly Savalas, Donald Sutherland, Trini López and Best Supporting Actor nominee John Cassavetes.
Tuesday, May 27, 2025
1:45am: Kelly’s Heroes (1970) — This Dirty Dozen-like war comedy follows a motley crew of American G.I.s who go AWOL to rob Nazi gold bars from a French bank that is located behind German lines. Clint Eastwood leads the cast as Kelly, with costars including Telly Savalas, Don Rickles, Carroll O’Connor, Donald Sutherland and Gavin MacLeod.
4:15am: Dark of the Sun (1968) — TCM concludes its Memorial Day marathon with this British adventure war film led by Rod Taylor, Yvette Mimieux and Jim Brown. The story follows a band of mercenaries during the Congo Crisis of the early 1960s.
MOVIES! CHANNEL
Monday, May 26, 2025 (Memorial Day)
The MOVIES! lineup may not be as expansive or long as TCM’s, airing only on Memorial Day itself, but it does feature a number of great titles, most of which are not being shown on the other network:
6am: The Desert Rats (1953) — Robert Wise directed this drama about the 1941 Siege of Tobruk during the North African campaign in World War II. Richard Burton and James Mason star.
7:55am: Decision Before Dawn (1951) — Richard Basehart and Gary Merrill star in this World War II drama that finds the U.S. Army recruiting German prisoners of war to spy behind enemy lines as the Allies continue their march toward Berlin.
10:30am: Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970) — This epic dramatization of the events leading up to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, which brought America into World War II, is told from both American and Japanese perspectives, and is helmed by filmmakers from both countries. Its cast also features American and Japanese actors, including Joseph Cotten, Martin Balsm, James Whitmore, Jason Robards, Sō Yamamura and Takahiro Tamura.
1:35pm: The Longest Day (1962) — Another great war epic, this production dramatizes the World War II Allied invasion of Nazi-held Western Europe at Normandy on D-Day (June 6, 1944). The large ensemble cast includes John Wayne, Robert Mitchum, Richard Burton, Sean Connery, Henry Fonda, Red Buttons, Peter Lawford, Eddie Albert, Jeffrey Hunter, Rod Steiger, George Segal, Robert Wagner, Paul Anka, Gert Fröbe and Curd Jürgens.
5:25pm: Mister Roberts (1955) — See earlier info.
8pm: None but the Brave (1965) — Frank Sinatra directed and stars in this film about two platoons, one from the Imperial Japanese Army and one from the U.S. Marine Corps, who are stranded on an uninhabited Pacific island and must learn to cooperate to survive. Clint Walker, Tommy Sands and Kenji Sahara also star.
10:15pm: Von Ryan’s Express (1965) — Sinatra also leads this World War II action flick about a group of Allied POWs who conduct a daring escape by hijacking the freight train that is carrying them and fleeing through German-occupied Italy to Switzerland. Trevor Howard costars.
Tuesday, May 27, 2025
12:45am: Patton (1970) — The MOVIES! Memorial Day marathon wraps up with this Best Picture-winning classic, a biopic of legendary Gen. George S. Patton (Best Actor winner George C. Scott, pictured below) and his exploits during World War II. Karl Malden also stars as Gen. Omar Bradley in the film, which, among other honors, won an Oscar for its screenplay by Francis Ford Coppola and Edmund H. North.
™ and © 20th Century Fox Film Corp. All Rights Reserved./Courtesy Everett Collection
AMC
Monday, May 26, 2025 (Memorial Day)
AMC commemorates Memorial Day with a couple of films and a famed World War II-set series:
6am: First Blood (1982) — The first in the action franchise led by Sylvester Stallone as Vietnam veteran John Rambo. Richard Crenna and Brian Dennehy costar.
8am: Hacksaw Ridge (2016) — Best Director nominee Mel Gibson helmed this Best Picture-nominated biographical war film about Desmond Doss (portrayed by Best Actor nominee Andrew Garfield), an American combat medic in World War II who, as a Seventh-day Adventist, refused to use a weapon of any kind. He was the first conscientious objector to be awarded the Medal of Honor, for his service during the Battle of Okinawa.
11am-1:20am (May 27): Band of Brothers (2001) — AMC is airing all 10 episodes of this acclaimed HBO miniseries produced by Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks. It dramatizes the history of “Easy” Company, 2nd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division, from their paratrooper training to their fighting in the Western Front of World War II.
Courtesy Everett Collection
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