All Quiet on the Western Front (1930 film)

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All Quiet on the Western Front
Directed by	Lewis Milestone
Produced by	Carl Laemmle Jr.
Written by	Erich Maria Remarque (novel)
Starring	Louis Wolheim Lew Ayres
Music by	David Broekman
Cinematography	Arthur Edeson
Editing by	Edgar Adams
Distributed by	Universal Pictures
Release date(s)	April 21, 1930
Running time	138 min. (copyright length)
Country	Image:Flag of the United States.svg United States
Language	English French
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All Quiet on the Western Front is an Academy Award-winning film based on the Erich Maria Remarque novel All Quiet on the Western Front. It was directed by Lewis Milestone, and stars Louis Wolheim, Lew Ayres, John Wray, Arnold Lucy and Ben Alexander.

Released in 1930 (see 1930 in film), it is considered a realistic and harrowing account of war and World War I, and was named #54 on the AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies. Also, in 1990, this film was selected and preserved by the United States Library of Congress' National Film Registry as being deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."

1 Synopsis
2 Production
3 Releases
4 Reception
5 Cast
6 External links

[edit] Synopsis

The film opens with a military parade and a rousing speech by a schoolmaster convincing his young students to enlist and "save the fatherland". The young enlistees are then portrayed in basic training, aching for "action" fighting in the war. Their training officer tells them to forget everything they know, they are going to become soldiers. Rigorous training diminishes the recruits' enthusiasm some. But after little more than marching drills, suddenly the cadets are told they are "going up front".

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Next the new soldiers arrive by train to the combat zone. It is mayhem with soldiers everywhere, incoming bombs and horse-drawn wagons racing around and rain. One in the group is killed before they even move away from the train. The new soldiers "fresh from the turnip patch" are assigned to a unit composed of older soldiers who are not exactly accommodating. The young soldiers are shocked to find out there is no food available at their post. They have not eaten since breakfast but their new unit has not had food for two days. They have sent out a scrounger to locate something to eat and he returns with a slaughtered hog. The young soldiers have to "pay" for their dinner with cigarettes.

"For the fatherland" the young soldiers unit is sent out on night duty. They travel packed into a flat cargo truck like sardines. The driver leaves them saying "If there's any of you left, there will be someone here to pick you up in the morning". The young recruits look longingly at the truck as it leaves. An experienced soldier gives the "schoolboys" some real world instructions, telling them how to deal with incoming shells, "When you see me flop, you flop. Only try to beat me to it". The unit is stringing wire and trying to avoid shells. Flares light up the night sky as the enemy tries to spot them, machine guns sound and a bombardment (heavy incoming shells) starts. A young soldier is blinded by shrapnel and runs around screaming. Most of the soldiers stay low in the trenches. When the truck arrives in the morning most of the unit has survived. More rain.

Back at the base (bunker in the trenches), the soldiers play cards and fight off the rats who eat their food and gear. The young soldiers are showing signs of great stress: nightmares, shaking uncontrollably, and screaming about the unrelenting bombs. A wall collapses and buries one of the recruits. No place is safe, not the front, not the base. There is no relief from the war. The celebratory parade already seems a distant memory. One recruit loses control, runs out of the trench and is injured. Some of the soldiers want to leave the trench and attack but the enemy seems to have superior firepower. When food finally comes, the men have to fight to get their share. Then they are overcome by rats and kill them with spades. Suddenly there is a break in the bombing and the men are ordered out to fight.

A loud rumbling can be heard as the enemy approaches and then more shells. Now the soldiers are in trenches with rifles ready as incoming shells move closer and closer. They can do nothing but wait and hope. Now the enemy is in view running toward the trenches, but the Germans hold their fire until the enemy is close. At least they have the advantage of being in trenches, the enemy is advancing over an open field. The Germans use machine gun fire and hand grenades and their rifles to mow down the enemy, quite effectively. The enemy suffers great losses but succeeds in entering the trenches where hand-to-hand combat with bayonets commences.

The enemy overruns the trenches and the Germans fall back, occupying bomb craters. The enemy is overwhelming now and the Germans fall back to a second row of trenches. German shells rain heavily on the enemy after which the Germans attack in hand-to-hand combat. The enemy has occupied the first row of trenches with machine gun positions and inflict heavy casualties on the Germans. The battle winds down. 70 of the 150 men in the unit have been killed.

The men of 2nd company return from the battle and line up for a meal. The cook refuses to feed them because he believes that the whole company has not arrived. The men explain that this is all that is left of the company and the cook refuses to give them all the food (beans, bread, and sausage) he has prepared. An argument follows and violence seems imminent when an officer arrives and orders the cook to give all the food to the men and to bring a plate to him. The cook fills a plate for the officer and leaves an assistant to distribute the food.

The men start out eating greedily, but then settle into a satiated torpor. They hear that they are to return to the front the next day and begin a semi-serious discussion about the causes of the war and of wars in general. They speculate about whether geographical features or people offend each other and whether these disagreements involve them. Tjaden speaks familiarly about himself and the Kaiser. They speculate about whether the Kaiser or manufacturers needs the war or whether it is the outcome of a fever. Katczinski suggests roping off a field and stripping the kings and their ministers down to their underwear and letting them fight it out with clubs. It is finally decided that they should go see their friend Kemmerich, who was wounded in the battle and is in a dressing station, and bring him his things.

Five of the men find Kemmerich in a very bad condition in the dressing station. He complains that his watch was stolen while he was under ether and that he is in pain in his left hand and right foot. Not realizing that Kemmerich did not know, Mueller lets slip that his right leg has been amputated and Kemmerich becomes upset. Kemmerich expresses regret that he would never become a forester and Paul tries to reassure him. Mueller sees Kemmerich's boots under the bed and tactlessly asks him for them. They all leave talking about Kemmerich's chances, but Paul returns and tried to cheer him up. Kemmerich begins to cry and Paul prays to God to spare Kemmerich from death. Kemmerich asks Paul to give his boots to Mueller and then loses consciousness. Paul tries to summon a doctor, but the doctor and the medic can do nothing. Paul leaves the dressing station with Kemmerich's boots and breaks into a run. Mueller is trying to talk about math to Katczinski when Paul brings him the boots. Mueller is pleased with the boots and says that he will not mind returning to the front in such fine boots. Paul describes how he reacted to Kemmerich's death by running and how it made him feel more alive and then hungry. There follows a sequence of battle scenes with no dialogue in which Mueller is killed and his boots are passed on to another soldier who is also killed. (1:06)

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Concern has been expressed that this article or section is missing information about: the plot. In the current synopsis, only the contents of the film's first 66 minutes are included.
This concern has been noted on the talk page where it may be discussed whether or not to include such information.

[edit] Production

In the film, Paul is shot while trying to grab a butterfly. This scene is different from the book, and was inspired by an early scene showing a butterfly collection in Paul's home.
The scene mentioned above was shot during the editing phase, so consequently, the actors were no longer available and Milestone had to portray his own hand as Paul's hand.

[edit] Releases

Universal re-released the film in 1939. It contained anti-Nazi announcements read out throughout the film in a March of Time style; yet the aim was to remind people of the horrors of wars in a time of international unrest.
In the late 20th Century and early 21st the United States Library of Congress undertook an exhaustive restoration of the film, which is vastly superior in sound and picture quality to most other existent prints.

[edit] Reception

Due to its anti-war and perceived anti-German messages, Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party banned the film from Germany in the 1930s and early 1940s. During its brief run in German cinemas in the early 1930s, the Nazis disrupted the viewings by releasing rats in the theaters. The ban wasn't lifted until the 1960s. Also, between the period of 1928 to 1941 this was one of many films to be banned in Australia by the Chief Censor Creswell O'Reilly.

The film won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1930 for its producer Carl Laemmle Jr., and an Academy Award for Directing for Lewis Milestone. It also received two further nominations: Best Cinematography, for Arthur Edeson, and Best Writing Achievement for Abbott, Anderson and Andrews. It was the first talkie war film to win Oscars.

Other wins:

1930 Photoplay Medal of Honor - Carl Laemmle Jr.
1931 Kinema Junpo Award for Best Foreign Language Film - Sound to Lewis Milestone
1990 National Film Registry

Without diluting or denying any...criticisms, it should be said that from World War I to Korea, Milestone could put the viewer into the middle of a battlefield, and make the hellish confusion of it seem all too real to the viewer. Steven Spielberg noted as much when he credited Milestone's work as partial inspiration for Saving Private Ryan ...Lewis Milestone made significant contributions to (the genre of) the war film. (Mayo, Mike: War Movies: Classic Conflict on Film, Visible Ink Press, 1999.)

[edit] Cast

Actor	Role
Louis Wolheim	Stanislaus Katczinsky
Lew Ayres	Paul Bäumer (as Lewis Ayres)
John Wray	Himmelstoss
Arnold Lucy	Professor Kantorek
Ben Alexander	Franz Kemmerich
Scott Kolk	Leer
Owen Davis, Jr.	Peter
Walter Rogers	Behn (as Walter Browne Rogers)
William Bakewell	Albert Kropp
Russell Gleason	Mueller
Richard Alexander	Westhus
Harold Goodwin	Detering
Slim Summerville	Tjaden (as 'Slim' Summerville)
G. Pat Collins	Lieutenant Bertinck (as Pat Collins)
Beryl Mercer	Mrs. Bäumer - Paul's Mother