Movie #2188 "All Quiet on the Western Front" 2022 (netflix) Why this particular film needs to be remade over and over and over I will never know --- and one of them previously won best picture (the 1930 one) , and now here comes another one......I can't say I remember all the renditions, but I was familiar with the story, for sure, having read the book. I was waiting for the classic ending to this story, which the other movies used, but not this one. The director chose to be more of a fatalist in his approach in this one and turn the ending into being more violent and gruesome, rather than tragic and poignant and ironic. In fact, the whole movie is more violent, gruesome, and more difficult to watch than the previous ones --- I guess because we can do that so much better in film now--- and if we can do it, then we do it to the umpth degree, I guess. The book left an indelible mark on me through the years, and I can still remember scenes from it, so I guess that speaks well for the book. And the 1930 movie has always had a special place in my heart, esp. for the delicacy of the ending, and the acting of Lew Ayres (who became a conscientious objector after making this film) --- However, the themes of the book are covered in this one: those being 1) the wickedness of extreme nationalism that draws people into war 2) antiwar themes , for sure, and esp. the toll it takes on the youth, and 3) and how manipulative leaders can be with the amount of power they have. This movie chose to follow two story lines and juxtapose them -- the one story shows 5 youths from a particular neighborhood in Germany and the glory they think war will be until one of them tragically dies in the first few minutes of fighting. The other story concerns the various meetings the leaders of the warring nations attend to come to some sort of agreement to end the war. The other renditions of the film don't spend a lot of time on that second story at all, but break up the film with more human stories that happen to the young men as the war tragically moves on..... so there's a difference I think that occurs while watching..... the when the young men in this rendition are just thrown into one terrible circumstance after another, they don't become as human to us because we spend less time with them. So as far as the film watching, there are breaks in the heaviness of the war scenes, but the heaviness makes the futility of the whole thing just that much more --- there seems to be no end, and when you get to the end, it doesn't end with any hope at all --- it's kind of like a video game --- with one tragedy after another --- and the characters don't come across as real --- I just thought we needed more poignant scenes instead of barreling on through. For that reason I do not recommend this film, nor will I be a fan of it winning best picture accolades (although, it probably will win best foreign film, esp. with the Ukraine war waging on right now -- it is very topical, in that sense.) But the cinematography is beautiful ---- it is just something I don't want to watch. After seeing it so many other times, I got the message, so it's preaching to the choir with this viewer. Id give it 3.5 out of 5.
"ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT" R 2 hours 28 mins 2022
A young German soldier's terrifying experiences and distress on the western front during World War I.
Director: Edward Berger
Writer:s: Edward Berger, Lesley Paterson, Ian Stokell
Actors: Felix Kammerer, Albrecht Schuch, Aaron Hilmer, Daniel Bruhl
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