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All Quiet on the Western Front

All Quiet on the Western Front (1930)

April. 29,1930
|
8.1
|
NR
| Drama War

When a group of idealistic young men join the German Army during World War, they are assigned to the Western Front, where their patriotism is destroyed by the harsh realities of combat.

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Cubussoli
1930/04/29

Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

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Ensofter
1930/04/30

Overrated and overhyped

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Mjeteconer
1930/05/01

Just perfect...

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Intcatinfo
1930/05/02

A Masterpiece!

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leplatypus
1930/05/03

The movie begins like the future documentary Triumph of the Will, with brave German soldiers marching in a German village, with call to courage, motherland, bla, bla, bla... Sure when those rookies finally train and go to the front, it's something really totally different and it's called reality: when you watch your comrades falling, throwing their guts, you find that there is no explanation to such a butchery! You realize that the only winners are firms that sells weapons, politicians who claim war and never do it, safe in their palace and that finally all those young lost lives have been useless... Sure the movie speaks like no other and there is really inspired moments, especially the final scene but honestly, a war or anti-war movie in black and white during the WWI and for 2 hours are however too much for me...

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ham_on_bluray
1930/05/04

The first 10 minutes of a film, in my opinion, is the most important part of any production. It establishes your characters, the tone, the setting, everything. The first 10 minutes of All Quiet on the Western Front is easily one of the best openings to any film I have ever seen in the past few years.The doors open and the camera pushes in to reveal hordes of soldiers moving in formation, marching for their country. It dollies to the left, following them as if to show us what to expect for the next 2 hours. The pull back and reveal a professor sermoning to the young and impressionable minds of the new generation about how honorable it is to serve. The benefits, the courage, the prizes, the glory. Long, intimate close-ups of each student show every perspective. Crying, smiling, even the in-betweeners that don't know what to feel.They take this romanticized idea of enlisting in the armed forces and sing their hearts out with glee and dance through their classroom screaming with joy in their wide-eyed childish wonderment. A wide shot as the boys leave their classroom and their chanting begins to fade out. An empty classroom only echoes the cheers of joy that it once held, while the audience watches in fear for it knows these young gentlemen are only walking to certain death.

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zardoz-13
1930/05/05

Louis Milestone's "All Quiet on the Western Front" is a testament not only to the resilience of author Erich Maria Remarque, who was wounded five times, but also to the determination by Universal Pictures producer Carl Laemmle, Jr., son of Universal Studios founder Carl Laemmle, to produce prestige films. If any movie demonstrated the absurdity of war, this movie does with images and scenes that are unforgettable. Told from the perspective of the Kaiser's army, we follow a school boy and his pals from the class room to the trenches. Initially, an elderly, spectacled, school teacher raves about how they must defend the pride of the fatherland as soldiers can be seen marching outside past the school. "Now, my beloved class, this is what we must do. Strike with all our power. Give every ounce of strength to win victory before the end of the year. It is with reluctance that I bring this subject up again. You are the life of the fatherland, you boys. You are the iron men of Germany. You are the gay heroes who will repulse the enemy when you are called upon to do so. It is not for me to suggest that any of you should stand up and offer to defend his country. But I wonder if such a thing is going through your heads. I know that in one of the schools, the boys have risen up in the classroom and enlisted in a mass. But, of course, if such a thing should happen here, you would not blame me for a feeling of pride." Paul (Lew Ayers) and then his pals encounter the true horrors of war. These horrors include not only the actual battlefield but the devastating horrors on their own side of the battlefield. Later, we watch as our protagonists struggle to make sense out of war and how it started. The most captivating character of the film is Kat (Louis Wolheim) who steals the film. Compared with contemporary films, "All Quiet on the Western Front" lacks the brutality of war, aside from one shot of two severed hands clinging to a barbed wire fence. Like most memorable war pictures, the action is confined to the trenches with no scenes played out in map rooms as general pontificate about strategy. Milestone would later helm more war movies, including "The Purple Heart" (1944), "A Walk in the Sun" (1945), "Halls of Montezuma" (1950) and "Pork Chop Hill" (1959).

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Bearded MovieGuy
1930/05/06

Well done movie that was influential enough that at least 2 remakes were made of it. It is pretty interesting, it is a war movie, but it is from the German perspective, starting with how the a group of youth are convinced to join the war effort by their teacher, being told it will be glorious and fun to fight and die for their Motherland. These same boys are all shocked when they finally do get in the war at how loud and ugly it is, and they are forced to grow up real fast as their friends are dying all around them. The story is good, and it looks decent considering when it was made. It is also cool to see when one of the boys who is now a man comes back and sees the teacher that talked him into going, just to find him giving the exact same speech that motivated him to a new class of teens. He is then asked to tell the students all about the glory of war, which he can't and after telling the kids how it really is, they consider him a coward and a traitor. All Quiet On The Western Front does a great job of showing war as the terrible thing it is, and how it is very different for those fighting compared to those who stay behind and criticize from the safety of their homes. Check out my video review https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIjFsdowDeg 5 Beards Out Of 5

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