#3 All Quiet on the Western Front 1930

This is a film adapted from a novel by German author Erich Maria Remarque. I didn't want to watch this movie at all. I am not big on war movies. It's not the violence so much as the senselessness, the needless killing. I think war is a mistake. That being said, this film gave me much to think about. It being from the German point of view, I expected it to be much more "Germany is great, everyone else is evil". In truth, the movie could be about any war, in any country. It follows a group of school boys, lured into enlisting by their teacher. The boys are led to believe that war is glamorous, and exciting. They soon learn that it is anything but. We learn that these boys are human beings underneath it all, and that war is hell for either side. "Innocence is lost on the battlefield". All Quiet on the Western Front also marks the 1st time a movie made a major political statement. Many Americans disliked the film because they thought it was sympathetic to the Germans. Many Germans disliked the film because they felt it portrayed the German soldiers as weak. Germany was gearing up to become a great military power, and didn't want the film to discourage men from enlisting. The movie is as sad as I though it would be, however , I was surprised that it didn't glamorize war in the slightest. Instead war is shown to be futile and at times tedious. "The film is not about heroism but about drudgery and futility and the gulf between the concept of war and the actuality". Really great movie, but it left me feeling sad as so many war movies do.