376 Films & TV Shows Set In North America During The 1940s
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Bugsy
Nevada California The 1940s The 1930sGlamour was the disguise. — New York gangster Ben 'Bugsy' Siegel takes a brief business trip to Los Angeles. A sharp-dressing womanizer with a foul temper, Siegel doesn't hesitate to kill or maim anyone crossing him. In L.A. the life, the movies, and most of all strong-willed Virginia Hill detain him while his family wait back home. Then a trip to a run-down gambling joint at a spot in the desert known as Las Vegas gives him his big idea.
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Dead Again
California The 1990s The 1940sA Mystery About True Love...And Certain Death. — In 1949 composer Roman Strauss is executed for the vicious murder of his wife Margaret with a pair of scissors. In 1990s Los Angeles a mute amnesiac woman shows up at an orphanage and private eye Mike Church is called in to investigate. Under hypnosis both the woman and Church seem to have a strange link back to the Strauss murder.
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Poison
🇫🇷 France 🇺🇸 United States of America The 1950s The 1940sThree intercut stories about outsiders, sex and violence. In "Hero," Richie, at age 7, kills his father and flies away. After the event, a documentary in cheesy lurid colors asks what Richie was like and what led up to the shooting. In the black and white "Horror," a scientist isolates the elixir of human sexuality, drinks it, and becomes a festering, contagious murderer; a female colleague who loves him tries to help, to her peril. In "Homo," a prisoner in Fontenal prison is drawn to an inmate whom he knew some years before, at Baton juvenile institute, and whose humiliations he witnessed. This story is told in dim light, except for the bright flashbacks.
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Cast a Deadly Spell
California The 1940sIn a fantastical 1940s where magic is used by everyone, a hard-boiled detective investigates the theft of a mystical tome.
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The Quarrel
Quebec The 1940sThey have one afternoon to reclaim their friendship... and their faith. — Montreal 1948. On Rosh Hashanah, Chaim (a Yiddish writer) is forced to think of his religion when he's asked to be the tenth in a minyan. As he sits in the park, he suddenly sees an old friend whom he hasn't seen since they quarrelled when they were yeshiva students together. Hersh, a rabbi, survived Auschwitz and his faith was strengthened by his ordeal, while Chaim escaped the Nazis, but had lost his faith long before. The two walk together, reminisce, and argue passionately about themselves, their actions, their lives, their religion, their old quarrel, and their friendship.
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Avalon
Maryland The 1950s The 1940sThree generations of family. They shared a dream called America in a place called Avalon. — Avalon is the third in Levinson's semi-autobiographical series of four "Baltimore Films": Diner (1982), Tin Men (1987), Avalon (1990), and Liberty Heights (1999). The film is set in Baltimore in the early 1950s and explores the themes of Jewish assimilation into American life.
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Memphis Belle
Tennessee The 1940sBrave young men who rode on the wings of victory. — The "Memphis Belle" is a World War II bomber, piloted by a young crew on dangerous bombing raids into Europe. The crew only have to make one more bombing raid before they have finished their duty and can go home. In the briefing before their last flight, the crew discover that the target for the day is Dresden, a heavily-defended city that invariably causes many Allied casualties
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Captain America
Ohio District of Columbia California Alaska 🇩🇪 Germany 🇮🇹 Italy The 1990s The 1940s The 1930sFrozen in the ice for decades, Captain America is freed to battle against arch-criminal, The Red Skull. — During World War II, a brave, patriotic American Soldier undergoes experiments to become a new supersoldier, "Captain America". Racing to Germany to sabotage the rockets of Nazi baddie "Red Skull", Captain America winds up frozen until the 1990s. He reawakens to find that the Red Skull has changed identities and is now planning to kidnap the President of the United States.
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The Two Jakes
California The 1940sThey say money makes the world go round. But sex was invented before money. — This sequel to the classic Chinatown finds private detective Jake Gittes still haunted from the events of the first film. Hired by a man to investigate his wife's infidelities, Jake once again finds himself involved in a complicated plot involving murder, oil, and even some ghosts from his past.
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Psycho IV – The Beginning
California The 1990s The 1950s The 1940sYou've met Norman. Now meet mother. — Norman Bates is again released from the mental hospital he was placed in at the end of Psycho III after serving another few years and is apparently rehabiliated for the second time. Norman is now married to a young nurse named Connie and is expecting a child. However, Norman fears that the child will inherit his mental illness. Meanwhile, Fran Ambrose is a radio talk show host who is discussing the topic of matricide with guest Dr. Richmond, Norman's former psychologist. The radio station receives a call from Norman, who uses the alias "Ed" to tell his story.
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Come See the Paradise
New York California Washington The 1940s The 1930sCome See The Paradise is a deeply touching love story set against the backdrop of a dramatic and controversial period in American history, It follows the romance and eventual marriage of Jack McGurn (Dennis Quad), a hot blooded Irish American, and a beautiful Japanese American Lily Dawanura (Tamlyn Tomita), at the outset of World War II. The clash of cultures, at once painful for the two lovers, becomes insurmountable after the Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor. Lily and the Kawamuras are relocated To a bleak, outdoor internment camp in California, Jack is drafted into the Army, powerless to help the woman he loves abandoning all hope of ever winning her family's approval.
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The Incident
Colorado The 1940sSmall Town — Small town lawyer, Harmon Cobb, defends a Nazi prisoner of war against murder charges. Set during World War II, Cobb has to contend with the difficulties of defending the devil when the town's only doctor (Barnard Hughes) dies while at "Camp Bremen" in the fictitious town of Bremen, Colorado.
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Sudie and Simpson
Georgia The 1940sA town torn apart by suspicion. A Friendship Forbidden by fear. A story you'll never forget. — A television movie about the friendship that develops between a young white girl and an older black man in a racist, rural Georgia town during the 1940s.
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Kaleidoscope
New York Connecticut California South Carolina 🇫🇷 France The 1990s The 1950s The 1940sYou might find out, or reunite. — A family friend hires gumshoe John Chapman to find and reunite three sisters estranged by fate for 30 years. The circuitous trail leads Chapman from the Big Apple to Beantown to the City of Light. His investigation, however, opens the door to disturbing revelations about a forgotten past.
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Driving Miss Daisy
Alabama Georgia The 1940s The 1950s The 1960s The 1970sThe funny, touching and totally irresistible story of a working relationship that became a 25-year friendship. — The story of an old Jewish widow named Daisy Werthan and her relationship with her black chauffeur, Hoke. From an initial mere work relationship grew in 25 years a strong friendship between the two very different characters in a time when those types of relationships where shunned.
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A Nightmare on Elm Street: The Dream Child
Ohio The 1980s The 1940sNow Freddy’s a daddy, he’s killing for two. — Alice, having survived the previous installment of the Nightmare series, finds the deadly dreams of Freddy Krueger starting once again. This time, the taunting murderer is striking through the sleeping mind of Alice's unborn child. His intention is to be "born again" into the real world. The only one who can stop Freddy is his dead mother, but can Alice free her spirit in time to save her own son?
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Great Balls of Fire!
England Mississippi Tennessee New York Kentucky The 1950s The 1940sThe true story of a legend. — The story of Jerry Lee Lewis, arguably the greatest and certainly one of the wildest musicians of the 1950s. His arrogance, remarkable talent, and unconventional lifestyle often brought him into conflict with others in the industry, and even earned him the scorn and condemnation of the public.
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Brenda Starr
New York The 1940sOff the comics onto the big screen... — Mike is a struggling artist who draws the 'Brenda Starr' strip for the papers. When Brenda comes to life in the strip and sees how unappreciated she is by Mike, she leaves the strip. To get her back, and keep his job, Mike draws himself into the strip. In her world, Brenda Starr is the Ace Reporter for the New York Flash. She is talented, fearless, smart and a very snappy dresser. The only competition she has is from the rival paper's top reporter Libby Lipscomb. Brenda heads to the Amazon jungle to find a scientist with a secret formula which will create cheap and powerful gas from ordinary water. (This movie was filmed in 1986 but release was delayed for several years.)
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The Last Aristocrats
Massachusetts 🇮🇹 Italy Jiangsu Province Shanghai The 1940sIn 1948, four young girls, daughters of Shanghai's elite, attending college in America find themselves unable to return after the Communists take Shanghai.
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Bye Bye Blues
Alberta The 1940sStory about a WWII wife & mother who joins a local dance band to provide for family while husband at war. Romantic involvement with one of the band members make her decisions difficult when husband returns from war. Story watches the progression of the band as it grows into a popular, successful recording and touring group. Excellent music and soundtrack.
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Who Framed Roger Rabbit
California The 1940sIt's the story of a man, a woman, and a rabbit in a triangle of trouble. — 'Toon star Roger is worried that his wife Jessica is playing pattycake with someone else, so the studio hires detective Eddie Valiant to snoop on her. But the stakes are quickly raised when Marvin Acme is found dead and Roger is the prime suspect.
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Big Business
New York West Virginia The 1940s The 1980sMixed up at birth, two sets of twins finally meet their match. — In the 1940s in the small town of Jupiter Hollow, two sets of identical twins are born in the same hospital on the same night. One set to a poor local family and the other to a rich family just passing through. The dizzy nurse on duty accidentally mixes the twins unbeknown to the parents. Our story flashes forward to the 1980s where the mismatched sets of twins are about to cross paths.
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Biloxi Blues
Mississippi The 1940sThe Army made Eugene a man. But Daisy gave him basic training! — During the Second World War, Eugene enlists in the US Army during the last year of the War and is sent to basic training in Biloxi Mississippi. There he must live with a variety of fellow soldiers while enduring the whims of a mentally unstable drill sergeant.
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Bird
Missouri The 1930s The 1940s The 1950sSaxophone player Charlie Parker comes to New York in 1940. He is quickly noticed for his remarkable way of playing. He becomes a drug addict but his loving wife Chan tries to help him.
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