The Movie Timeline - be obsessive, be very obsessive
Tuesday 30th January: After nearly three years in captivity, 511 allied POWs are rescued from the Cabanatuan Prison Camp by a joint effort of Filipino guerillas and Army Rangers led by Capt Robert Prince under the command of Lt Col Henry Mucci. (The Philippines - The Great Raid)
February: Rachel Stein becomes Ellis de Vries and works for the resistance as a spy in Gestapo HQ. (Holland - Black Book)
Monday 19th February: Operation Detachment, the U.S. Marines' invasion of Iwo Jima, is launched. (Flags of Our Fathers)
Friday 23rd February: U.S. Marines raise the American flag atop Mt. Suribachi, the highest point on the island and a key strategic point. (Iwo Jima - Flags of Our Fathers)
Thursday 29th March: Gen. George S. Patton's 3rd Army captures Frankfurt, as "Old Blood and Guts" continues his march east. (Frankfurt, Germany - Patton)
Saturday 14th April: George S Patton promoted to General. (Patton)
Wednesday 18th April: Ernie Pyle killed by Japanese machine-gun fire. (le Shima, off the coast of Okinawa, Japan - From Two Men and a War)
Thursday 19th April: SS Officer Ludwig Muntze is arrested for negotiating with terrorists and sent for execution. (Holland - Black Book)
Friday 20th April: The Dutch Resistance break into Gestapo HQ for a rescue attempt, but it is a set-up and most are killed. (Holland - Black Book)
Friday 20th April: On the morning of Hitler's 56th birthday, Russian artillery fire finally hits Berlin. (Berlin - Downfall)
Saturday 21st April: Ellis de Vriers is arrested as a spy by SS Officer Franken - she and Franken's former boss Ludwig Muntze escape to a locally moored boat. (Holland - Black Book)
Monday 23rd April: Adolf Hitler tells Eva Braun the best way to commit suicide, and declares privately that he believes the war is lost. (Berlin - Downfall)
Tuesday 24th April: President Truman is briefed on the Manhattan Project. (Truman)
Monday 30th April: Adolf Hitler commits suicide. (Berlin, Germany - Death of Adolf Hitler, The )
Monday 30th April: Hitler commits suicide. (Downfall)
Saturday 5th May: The German forces in the Netherlands surrender; Eliss de Vries and Ludwig Muntze face an uncertain future as they are sought as Nazis; SS Officer Franken tries to escape to Hamburg on a boat filled with stolen Jewish loot. (Holland - Black Book)
Monday 7th May: Tommy born to Mrs Walker on the day that Germans surrender and end World War II. (London - Tommy)
Wednesday 9th May: Herman Goering is captured by the U.S. Seventh Army. (Bavaria - Inside the Third Reich)
Friday 11th May: Brunnlitz liberated by Russians. (Schindler's List)
Thursday 24th May: Priscilla Presley is born. (Brooklyn, New York - Elvis)
Sunday 27th May: Kenneth H. Dahlberg is awarded the Distinguished Service Cross . (All the President's Men)
Friday 8th June: President Truman issues order regarding release of classified scientific information. (Truman)
Friday 15th June: Judy Garland marries Vincente Minnelli. (Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows )
Tuesday 19th June: Tobias J.A. Wolff is born. (Birmingham, Alabama - This Boy's Life)
Friday 29th June: 800 men are eaten by sharks after delivering the Hiroshima bomb. (Jaws)
Thursday 26th July: Winston Churchill is forced to resign as Prime Minister following his party's electoral defeat by the Labour Party. (Young Winston)
Monday 6th August: The first atomic bomb dropped over Japan. (Hiroshima - Enola Gay and the Atomic Bombing of Japan)
Monday 6th August: The Hiroshima bomb is dropped at 8:15. (Hiroshima, Japan - The Number 23)
Wednesday 15th August: Emperor Hirohito broadcasts the news of Japan's surrender to the Japanese people. (MacArthur)
Thursday 16th August: Lt. Gen. Jonathan Wainwright is freed by Russian forces from a POW camp. (Manchuria, China - MacArthur)
Saturday 18th August: Despondent after learning of the death of his wife and three young children in the bombing of Hiroshima, camp commander Colonel Suga takes three small children from the POW camp to feast at his home. (Borneo, Southeast Asia - Three Came Home)
Tuesday 11th September: After nearly four years of forced separation, Agnes Newton Keith and her little boy Georgie are reunited with husband/father Harry when their Japanese captors abruptly abandon their POW camp in the face of an eminent Allied invasion. (Borneo, Southeast Asia - Three Came Home)
Saturday 22nd September: Gen. George S. Patton tells reporters that he does not see the need for "this denazification thing" and compares the controversy over Nazism to a "Democratic and Republican election fight.". (Patton)
Wednesday 3rd October: Peter Appleton attends the 'Bread Instead Of Bullets Club' in order to impress a girl, and not because of any communist leanings. (The Majestic)
Wednesday 17th October: Juan Peron addresses Argentina. (buenos aires - Evita)
Monday 24th December: George Bailey decides to live again. (Bedford Falls, New York - It's a Wonderful Life)
Future Dreamgirl Lorrell Robinson is born. (Dreamgirls)
Juan Peron elected President of Argentina. (Evita)
Capt. Fairborne comes to Borneo and finds an American deserter has become king of the headhunters. (Borneo - Farewell to the King)
Judith Myers born. (Halloween)
Dean Martin flies to the 500 Club to help Jerry Lewis's ailing stage-show. (Atlantic City, New Jersey - Martin and Lewis)
Lionel Twain picked up for smuggling a truckload of rich white Americans across into Mexico to pick melons. (El Paso - Murder By Death)
Thursday 7th March: Nicholas Garrigan - future doctor and advisor to Idi Amin - is born. (Scotland - The Last King of Scotland)
Thursday 7th March: Joan Crawford is awarded the Oscar for her performance in "Mildred Pierce". (Mommie Dearest)
April: Free democratic elections are held. (Czechoslovakia - Bobby)
Thursday 13th June: Jason Voorhees born. (Friday The 13th)
Thursday 13th June: Jason Voorhees is born to Pamela and Elias. (Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter)
Thursday 13th June: Edward "Major" Bowes dies. (Rumson, New Jersey - Sinatra)
Thursday 4th July: Ron Kovic is born. (Ladysmith, Wisconsin - Born on the Fourth of July)
Sunday 7th July: Howard Hughes crashes his plane into three homes. (Beverly Hills, CA - The Aviator)
Friday 13th September: Amon Goeth executed for war crimes in Poland. (Schindler's List)
October: Gordie Lachance is born - Chris Chambers, Teddy Duchamp and Vern Tessio are born within months. (Castle Rock, Maine - Stand By Me)
Tuesday 5th November: Bucky "Mr Ice" Bleichert takes on his future partner, Lee "Mr Fire" Blanchard in a charity boxing match; Bleichert takes a dive in the 8th round. (Los Angeles, Ca - The Black Dahlia)
Thursday 26th December: Bugsy Siegel opens The Pink Flamingo Hotel & Casino. (Las Vegas, Nevada - Bugsy)
Howard Hughes test-flights the Blue Spruce. (The Aviator)
Elizabeth Short is found brutally murdered & bizarrely mutilated; Emmett Linscott family is implicated. (Los Angeles, Ca - The Black Dahlia)
Brighton Rock. (Brighton Rock)
Philadelphia Mass Turbulence, related to 'symmetrical bookstacking'. (Philadelphia, PA - Ghostbusters)
Tom Hagen becomes consigliere to Don Corleone; Michael Corleone marries Apollonia in Sicily, who dies very soon after. (The Godfather)
"Smiler" Grogan robs a tuna factory of $350,000 and buries the money under the big W at Rosita Beach State Park. (Santa Rosita, CA - It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World)