 Although the movie is set in World War Two, the basic situation on  which the story is loosely based is that of the World War One naval  battles of Coronel in the South Pacific and the Falkland Islands in  the South Atlantic, both of which took place in 1914. As in the  film, a British cruiser force was defeated in the first battle by a  superior German force and then Royal Navy reinforcements sent from  England allowed the British to triumph in the second encounter.