The Great Raid

The Great Raid (2005) — watch online on iFILM — is director John Dahl's account of the January 1945 Cabanatuan prisoner rescue, one of the most audacious operations of the Pacific War. Benjamin Bratt and James Franco lead the cast, with Sam Worthington and Joseph Fiennes in support.

Five hundred American POWs are facing execution as the Japanese command prepares to eliminate the camp before Allied forces close in. Colonel Henry Mucci's Sixth Ranger Battalion has to push thirty miles behind enemy lines, coordinate with Filipino guerrillas, and get the men out without a firefight turning into a massacre. Inside Cabanatuan, Margaret Utinsky — played by Connie Nielsen — has been smuggling medicine through the resistance, a detail the film handles with unusual care for a war picture.

Dahl keeps the tone disciplined: no swelling speeches, no convenient heroism. The operation's success depended on timing, intelligence and a lot of things going right at once, and the film respects that. Stream The Great Raid (2005) online on iFILM.