Well, to my embarrassment I've never read the book nor seen the movie. The question was about films portraying the German view, and that one hadn't been mentioned.

Wait... what? Someone complaining that the movie was too much like the book? Has this ever happened before?

Isn't the one complaint about any movie based on a book that is deviated from the book in some way? (The one reason why I hate the end of Flight of the Intruder)

Well, there's always Die Hard, in which case the film was much better than the book.

Ah, okay.

They're both worth a look for someone interested in the subject but the movie's just not the finely crafted biopic I was hoping for when I sat down to watch it, especially given some of the casting.

Were there any finely crafted biopics made during that era? There aren't all that many from any time.

Bruce Willis could star in the movie adaptation of a cookbook and he would make it awesome! :O:

Yeah, the Die Hard series were kinda special.

I also enjoyed the Lethal Weapon series.

I don't know if I can explain it better. Obviously I don't object that the movie followed the book in the sense that it didn't invent a lot of stuff to make the story more exciting or sexy or whatever the studio thought it needed to make $$ or because some screenwriter thought he could write a more interesting version of someone's life than they actually lived.

But the movie felt to me like it relied too heavily on the book stylistically. Watching the movie for me was kind of like having someone read the book out loud to me, with actors coming along to act out bits and pieces of the story. But they weren't telling the story, some voice representing the book's author was doing that.

Sorry I was just naming any submarines that came to mind at the time.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0109779/ maybe not related with "German point of view" that much, but surely with "history is written by the victor" :D
you have also Die Gustlof, a german production, but it's not even worth posting a link to imdb.

Sorry but for me The Cross of Iron has nothing to do with a german point of view. At least in comparison to Stalingrad for example. I'm not saying that only germans can make good films about german army but the way Peckinpah made that story is just too "western-like".
One more imba movie: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0363163/ fully based on J.Fest's idea of what happened in the bunker.

All quiet on the western front
 

All quiet on the western front:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0020629/

Yes I know wrong war, but still had to be mentioned

Good choice, nonetheless. Book trumps the movie, but the movie was still pretty decent.

At least the original black and white version. The "new" one with John boy Walton and Earnest Borgnine is,...meh.

In terms of books get the Sven Hassel series. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sven_Hassel Even the egnlish translations are a fun read with lots of action, dark humour and although some of the plots get a bit far fetched in the later books, they give a pretty good picture of what life was like for the German tank soldier.

One of the got made into a pretty bad movie in the '80's. It was based loosely on Hassels book Wheels of Terror but was names The Misfit Brigade for some reason.

I also highly recommend The Good Soldier Švejk WWI again but hilarious. There are a few versions around but I think the 13 part German TV version is best.

Well, no books here, but in the way of movies, check out this one (maybe you've seen it already):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ixRh...eature=related

It's unfortunately a very poor quality upload. At one point, there was a HD version up on youtube, which is when I watched it. I could only find this low quality one now - seems like the other version was removed on copyright grounds.
It's a very well made movie I think. Granted, it's not a Japanese movie, but an American one directed by Clint Eastwood (who imho is a great actor and film director). So I don't know if it would qualify your demand for "the Japanese view." But Eastwood tried to portray it from that perspective and I think it is done very well.


Or try this one (which I haven't seen in full yet, and afaik it's not in full on youtube, either):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imtQE...eature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czAws...eature=related