All Quiet on the Western Front (1930)

All Quiet on the Western Front is a 1930 American epic pre-Code anti-war film based on the Erich Maria Remarque novel of the same name. Directed by Lewis Milestone, it stars Louis Wolheim, Lew Ayres, John Wray, Arnold Lucy and Ben Alexander.

Why It Rocks

 * 1) The film stays 100% faithful to the war novel it's based on, and pretty much captures the overall message of just how futile war can be, and it just leads to tragedy and loss.
 * 2) Just like the novel, it's told in the perspective of one of the soldiers (Paul Bäumer) to show the reason they decided to fight in the war, which would enhance the effect of the film and help paint the war as the stuff of horrors. This technique would continue to be used in later war films like Platoon, Full Metal Jacket, and Saving Private Ryan.
 * 3) Unlike Remarque's novel however, where begins with the young men already at war, with flashbacks to earlier times, the film is told in a logical, chronological fashion.
 * 4) One particularly note-worthy aspect of the film is that it doesn't focus on fighting, but rather it concentrated on the young characters who would be sent to the front.
 * 5) *Everyone in the cast does amazing performances:
 * 6) *Lew Ayers' inexperience as an actor at the time suited his character (Paul Baumer)'s naivete.
 * 7) *Louis Wolheim's broken nose and guttural voice makes him an excellent choice for "Kat", a hard-bitten sergeant.
 * 8) *Slim Summerville -- a former Keystone Kop and director of slapstick shorts -- specialized in portrayed rural bumpkins. He's the closest thing the film has to comic relief.
 * 9) Milestone has a unique style of direction shown in the film, most notably during the battle scenes. Various silent film techniques are used to free the camera, letting it soar over crowds on a crane or prowl up the asides of a high school.
 * 10) *At the same time, Milestone mixed sound adroitly, using the marching bands to drown out a teacher's lecture, constructed montages that gave the effects of delving into characters' thoughts through free association techniques.
 * 11) *The camera serves as a kind of machine gun at one point, shooting down the oncoming troops as it glides along the trenches.
 * 12) The film's lack of a soundtrack and reliance on dialogue and sounds from the film adds to the scariness and emotional impact it's presenting.
 * 13) The film is so emotionally draining and realistic that it will scar endless viewers watching the film. It's still powerful 80 years later.
 * 14) Despite many of the war introduction scenes becoming cliches over countless years, they retain almost a documentary realism here, mainly due to the fact that the film doesn't glorify the war. In The Birth of a Nation -- an inspiration for many of the film's battle scenes -- viewers are meant to root for the Southern side, but in this film, there's no one to root for, which is pretty striking since Germany was the enemy for much of the film's audience.
 * 15) Astonishing set design. More than 20 acres of a large California ranch were made into battlefields occupied by more than 2,000 ex-servicemen extras.
 * 16) The ending scene where Paul and Kat die is an extremely sad moment.