Many Wars Ago

Many Wars Ago (Uomini contro, 1970) is Francesco Rosi's brutal war drama, yours to watch online on iFILM. On the Italian Alpine front of World War I, wave after wave of infantry is thrown at an Austrian machine gun dug into a peak nobody can take.

Lieutenant Sassu watches General Leone — an old aristocrat who treats his men as numbers — order the same suicidal charge over and over. Gian Maria Volonté plays Leone with a chilling calm. As the corpses stack up, Sassu starts asking what duty means when the orders are simply madness, and mutiny begins to stir in the trenches.

Adapted from Emilio Lussu's memoir A Year on the Plateau, the film drains war of any glory and turns its cold anger on the men who spend lives from behind a desk. It's for viewers who want anti-war cinema with no rousing score and no easy heroes. Stream Many Wars Ago (1970) online on iFILM.