Wednesday, March 13All That Matters

All Quiet on the Western Front [1930] depicts one of the most brutal battle scenes ever filmed. I still find it hard to believe this movie is almost 100 years old.


All Quiet on the Western Front [1930] depicts one of the most brutal battle scenes ever filmed. I still find it hard to believe this movie is almost 100 years old.




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15 Comments

  • lostonpolk

    There are areas of France that still bear the results of all that ‘landscaping.’

    Also, those hands! Definitely pre-code Hollywood.

  • ConflagWex

    Why do some of the hand-to-hand combat scenes have a stop-motion feel to them? Is that just the frame rate, or did they film them slow (to prevent injury or something) then speed it up?

    Great scene, just trying to figure out why that’s setting off alarm bells.

  • slvrbullet87

    It is just so brutal and shows the pointlessness of WW1. Can you tell if the attackers and defenders are Brits/French/German/American? Does it matter? It is just one of the thousands of times that an entire division was sent over the top to be slaughtered for no gain. There is nothing heroic about it, just young men charging directly into a storm of steel with another group of young men being scared forever firing back at them.

  • bobpetersen55

    This set the standard for all war movies to follow. An amazing masterpiece, with an also excellent book by Erich Maria Remarque. The details of the effects of war and the tactics used are just as poignantly described and even more disturbing. A superb case of were both novel and film of a source material are used flawlessly within their medium.

  • Orefeus

    Fun fact: German heavy machine guns would only move left and right (not up and down) and a lot of times the gunners would cut people in half

  • monkeyhind

    It’s a great anti-war film, with the young men patriotically enlisting after listening to their teacher talk about the glories of war, only to find that war is hell. Interesting too that it was about young Germans though it could have been about the youth of any country — especially since it’s a silent movie.

  • sonofthenation

    My Grandfather fought in WWI. I carry his dog tag with me every day. I asked him about the war. He wouldn’t talk about it. I asked him if he fired his rifle in combat. All he said was yes.

  • TakeShitsMuch

    Holy shit. I’ve never seen the original or that scene but holy shit, I’ve literally never seen a movie from that time period that didn’t pull any punches like that. There’s no goofy/old style “frantic” or “mass panic” type acting. This look like a camera was on the front watching men fight for real. It’s really impressive

    Also, while I love classic movies I wouldn’t call very many from the 20s-40s very good. A lot were impressive for their time but for cinematography, fight choreography, and acting they weren’t very believable. But this scene was brutal. I’m desperate to watch the full thing now

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