The 10 Best Movies About Aircraft Carriers
Voting Rules
Vote on the top movies about aircraft carriers or movies that predominately feature an aircraft carrier.
- Photo: The Hunt for Red OctoberIn The Hunt for Red October, CIA analyst Jack Ryan (Alec Baldwin) faces a high-stakes naval chase. A renegade Soviet submarine captain, Marko Ramius (Sean Connery), has taken the USSR's most advanced nuclear sub, The Red October, on an unauthorized mission towards U.S. waters. As tensions rise between superpowers, Ryan must decipher whether Ramius plans to unleash nuclear war or defect to the West. Based on Tom Clancy's best-selling novel, this Cold War thriller combines suspense and political intrigue, earning three Academy Award nominations. Exceptional performances by Baldwin and Connery add depth to this tale of strategy and survival at sea.
- Pearl Harbor (2001) is an epic war film that masterfully blends romance and action. Rafe McCawley (Ben Affleck) and Danny Walker (Josh Hartnett), are childhood friends turned Army Air Corps pilots, who find themselves in a love triangle with the beautiful nurse Evelyn Johnson (Kate Beckinsale). As their personal drama unfolds, the harrowing events of December 7, 1941 - the infamous attack on Pearl Harbor - catapult our protagonists into the throes of World War II. Directed by Michael Bay, this film won an Academy Award for Best Sound Editing.
- Photo: The Final CountdownA time warp takes the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz and its captain (Kirk Douglas) back to Pearl Harbor, Dec. 6, 1941.
- Photo: Paramount PicturesIn the high-octane film Top Gun, Pete Maverick Mitchell (Tom Cruise) is an audacious naval aviator with an insatiable need for speed. His reckless flying style lands him a spot at the prestigious Fighter Weapons School, known as Top Gun, where he competes against the best fighter pilots in the country. Here, Maverick meets his match in both the air and on ground - rival pilot Tom Iceman Kazansky (Val Kilmer) and astrophysics instructor Charlotte Charlie Blackwood (Kelly McGillis). This 1986 action drama directed by Tony Scott won an Academy Award for Best Original Song and is celebrated for its thrilling aerial sequences and iconic soundtrack.
- Photo: BattleshipLt. Alex Hopper (Taylor Kitsch) is a weapons officer aboard the destroyer USS John Paul Jones, while his older brother, Stone (Alexander Skarsgård), is the commanding officer of the USS Sampson. Unknown to Alex, Stone or the rest of the U.S. Navy, alien invaders have arrived on Earth with plans to steal Earth's resources. When a confrontation with the invaders knocks out the Navy's radar capability, American and Japanese forces must work together to find a way to save the planet.
- Photo: Universal PicturesIn this dramatization of the Battle of Midway during World War II, U.S. Navy Adm. Chester Nimitz (Henry Fonda) leads an outnumbered unit in the Pacific to break Japanese encryption codes. They soon discover that Adm. Yamamoto (Toshirô Mifune) plans an ambush of the U.S. base on the island of Midway. Capt. Matt Garth (Charlton Heston) helps devise the Navy's strategy, while his pilot son, Tom (Edward Albert), falls in love with a Japanese-American woman who is headed for an internment camp.
- Photo: 20th Century FoxA Navy pilot (Owen Wilson) is shot down over enemy territory, and struggles to survive the relentless pursuit of a ruthless secret police enforcer, a deadly tracker, and countless hostile troops. With time running out, the injured pilot's commanding officer (Gene Hackman) goes against orders to carry out a desperate rescue mission.
- Photo: Paramount PicturesAfter more than 30 years of service as one of the Navy's top aviators, Pete "Maverick" Mitchell is where he belongs, pushing the envelope as a courageous test pilot and dodging the advancement in rank that would ground him. Training a detachment of graduates for a special assignment, Maverick must confront the ghosts of his past and his deepest fears, culminating in a mission that demands the ultimate sacrifice from those who choose to fly it.
- Photo: Under SiegeA heroic loner takes on a group of nuclear terrorists in this seagoing tale. Posing as a rock band, the terrorists get themselves hired for a party aboard the USS Missouri, a battleship en route to Pearl Harbor for decommissioning. They plan to steal the ship's nuclear arsenal but haven't reckoned on the intervention of the ship's chef, a decorated former Navy SEAL.
- Photo: Flight of the IntruderU.S. Navy pilot Lt. Jake Grafton (Brad Johnson) and his bombardier buddy, Lt. Cmdr. Virgil Cole (Willem Dafoe), are two soldiers embedded in the Vietnam War growing frustrated by the military's constraints on their missions. Despite the best efforts of their commanding officer, Cmdr. Frank Camparelli (Danny Glover), to re-engage them, this disillusioned pair decide to take the war effort into their own hands with an explosive battle plan that could well get them court-martialed.
