10 Awesome War Movies About Obscure Conflicts

OK, so the ongoing military occupation of Afghanistan isn’t exactly obscure, but for some reason it’s underrepresented in war movies, particularly in comparison to the Iraq war. Whilst it has little to say about the broader context or politics of the third Anglo-Afghan war, this movie about a British paratrooper unit bogged down in a wadi filled with Soviet mines is a taut, finely tuned, harrowing ordeal. And it's all the more powerful because it's a true story.

Three Para are assigned a dull detail performing routine overwatch of a strategically important dam in Helmand Province. There's not much to report, but they do see some suspicious activity at a local petrol station and some extortion on one of the nearby roads.

It's time to patrol, so a group of the soldiers take a stroll down the goat path, through the wadi, and back up to the other side of the valley. But they don't get that far: as soon as they reach the river bed that forms the valley floor, they realise that they have strayed into an old Soviet minefield.

The Soviets left ten million mines in Afghanistan when they abandoned their war in the Graveyard of Empires. Fewer than ten explode in this film, but every single blast is a gut punch. Who knew that soldiers slowly walking in a straight line could be such a gripping watch?