All Quiet on the Western Front (2022)
Rating: 8.5/10
Starring: Felix Kammerer, Albrecht Schuch and Daniel Bruhl
Rated R for graphic war violence, blood, gore, and language
War. What is it good for?
That question, famously asked over and over throughout Edwin Starr’s anti-Vietnam anthem “War”, has reverberated throughout human history. Many movies and television series have posed the question, only occasionally offering some answer (freedom, redemption, etc…). But seldom has the question “what is the value of war” been asked more urgently than in the searing All Quiet on the Western Front, a new film in wide release on Netflix.
A German-made production, All Quiet is the third major film adaptation of the 1928 Erich Maria Remarque novel whose gritty, somber tone and inglorious subject matter caused it to be banned by the Nazis as they pulled their country up from the literal and figurative ashes of World War 1. Like contemporary war epics Platoon, Saving Private Ryan, We Were Soldiers and 1917, All Quiet on the Western Front shows in stark, brutal terms what front-line combat really is. Unlike some of those movies, All Quiet depicts how ideals such as glory, valor and patriotism become meaningless to those on the front lines almost immediately. Indeed, within the first 15 minutes of All Quiet, one can sense the sad sentiment expressed in Starr’s first verse”:
‘Cause it means
destruction of innocent lives
War means tears to
thousands of mothers’ eyes
When their sons go off
to fight
And lose their lives
By 1917, “The Great War” had been raging for three years, and history shows that precious little had been (or would be) achieved in the mud and trenches of France’s Western Front. Those futile facts are unknown to German teen Paul Baumer (Felix Kammerer), a well-educated young man full of patriotic fervor whose parents oppose the idea of him signing up to fight. Paul ultimately forges his parents’ signatures and joins the army alongside his best friends, thrilled by officers’ rousing speeches filled with stirring slogans (“for the Kaiser, God, and the Fatherland”) and promises of victory. The gleam of these fantastic sentiments vanishes, however, about as soon as Paul and his friends are dropped in the trenches, sloshing through freezing mud and cowering amidst artillery barrages. While there is camaraderie to be found within the company, Paul also finds gnawing hunger, the abject terror of engagements with the enemy, and the fading hope that he will ever see home again, or that he'll be the same if he gets there.
Occasionally interrupting this grim tableau is the quiet journey of German politician Matthias Ertzberger (Daniel Bruhl), who, horrified by the mounting, endless loss of life (the film’s stunning prologue is a fierce reminder of the cheap disposability of life in the war machine), is sent to negotiate a ceasefire with the Allied Powers. Contrasting Ertzberger’s desperate peace-seeking mission is the iron-hearted approach of Western Front commander General Friedrichs (Devid Striesow), who sees the ceasefire on the horizon but has no intention of seeing his mighty Fatherland end the war meekly.
As was surely intended, these parallel story threads convey the cavernous and inescapable gulf between the men making the war, and those fighting it. While high-minded statesmen consider history, legacy and the greatness of their homelands’ reputation, soldiers on the front lines scramble for masks amidst deadly gas attacks, steal from local farms to keep from starving, and watch their comrades – the only people who could relate to their experiences – die in muck and puddles of their own blood. The scenes with Ertzberger and Friedrichs are not showy or preachy, but All Quiet’s viewers will be so shaken by the punishing battle scenes that they will understand the ultimatum all too plainly—make peace, shelve pride, or millions of human beings with families, souls, and dreams will succumb to bullets, flames, gas, or the horrifying specter of being crushed by a tank.
I was astonished to learn that Felix Kammerer is making his film debut as Paul Baumer; his haunted visage proves a seamless portal into this darkest and most desperate of worlds. One sequence, in which Paul fatally stabs a Frenchman who goes on to live several minutes longer than Paul (or we) would expect, while Paul rides a grueling rollercoaster of emotions, from fury to angst and gut-wrenching remorse, is absolutely shattering. Supporting Kammerer is a cast short on noticeable names but high on humanity, with Aaron Hilmer playing a wisecracker who becomes another shrieking, desperate boy amidst the shells, and Bruhl expertly depicting the nearly silent struggle of a peacekeeper weighing stubborn national pride against desire for the war’s end.
My complaints are few. The movie is maybe 20 minutes too long, with a few suspense-building takes in particular padding the length unnecessarily. And, while the actors do the aforementioned admirable job, I doubt the characters will resonate, as those in Platoon and Private Ryan have.
These are quibbles. What one will remember about All Quiet is the nightmarish intensity of the battle scenes, the image of Kammerer’s wide eyes peering through a mud-and-grime-encrusted face, and the Oscar nominations the film could receive in a few months’ time (it’s Germany’s entrant for Best Foreign Language Film, but warrants consideration for the directing, screenplay, and technical awards as well). There’s also the ominous three-note chime that defines the musical score, chilling every time. And there’s the grimness of the war concept, shone in its bleak, ugly frankness, underlining the awfulness of our history and the heartbreaking reality that war rages in our world today, in the Ukraine and elsewhere.
Yes, some armed conflicts throughout history have freed people and nations from oppression; others have defeated evils great and small. But what the newest adaptation of All Quiet on the Western Front suggests in shouts, screams, and whispers across two-plus-hours is the very answer Starr gave, again and again, in his timeless anthem:
All Quiet on the Western Front (2022)
Directed by Edward Berger
Screenplay by Edward Berger, Lesley Patterson, and Ian Stokell
Based on the novel “All Quiet on the Western Front” by Erich Maria Remarque
Length: 2 hours, 28 minutes
Rated R
“War” by Edwin Starr was released in 1970 by Columbia Records
