The Worst Version of “All Quiet…”

 

Today marks the anniversary of the publishing of the greatest anti-war novel in 1929.  A new movie brings the book to the silver screen for the third time.  Does the movie deserve all the applause?

                I had every reason to enjoy the new “All Quiet on the Western Front”.  I had been waiting for it for about a decade.  When I first read it was going to be made, it was to star Daniel Ratcliffe.  Granted, that was casting that caused some concern, but if John Boy Walton could do a good job as Paul Baumer, then so could Harry Potter.  As the years passed by, Daniel Bruhl (an outstanding German actor) was attached to the project.  That was certainly an upgrade.  Now, if they could just make the damn movie!  Finally, Netflix stepped in and we got a German version of the German novel.

  Erich Marie Remarque wrote the most famous anti-war novel and published it on Jan. 31, 1929.  It has sold more than 20 million copies.  It was made into the most famous anti-war movie which was released in 1930.  A version was made for TV in 1979.  The 2022 has been lauded as the best version.  And several critics (and many viewers) have praised it as the most realistic war movie ever made.  It currently has a 92% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.  It has been nominated for 14 BAFTAs and 9 Oscars, including both Best Picture and Best International Feature.

If you have read my review, you know I find the movie greatly overrated.  The claims of the movie’s greatness has caused me to rewatch the film and while it is a decent war movie, it certainly does not deserve the accolades.  There are two big problems with the film.  First, the fighting may be realistic (although I would suggest what people are praising as realistic is actually simply more graphic deaths than viewers are used to seeing in a war movie) in its combat scenes, but the plot has some very unrealistic developments.  Second, it is laughable that the movie carrries the title of the novel, because there is very little from Remarque’s book in the movie.  It is infuriating to read reviews that say that the director and screenwriter “decided to stay as faithful to the original source as possible.”  That is pure bullshit and had to come from someone who never read the book or saw the 1930 version. In fact, I would be surprised if the director and screenwriter read the book.    Here are some observations I have about the movie.  (Spoiler alert)

Here are the scenes that were inspired by the novel:

1.  A teacher gives a speech to a group of students, urging them to go to war.  C  In the book and both earlier movies, the speech is delivered in a classroom session and is less of a demand that the boys enlist.  It highlights a core group of friends that the book will follow.

2.  The soldiers are in a bunker during a bombardment.  They quickly start to panic and one runs out and is killed by a shell.  The roof caves in, Paul is covered up.  F  In the book, the men are under bombardment for days.  The veterans take it in stride, but a couple of the newly arrived soldiers crack.  Nothing happens to the bunker and the soldiers exit when the bombardment lifts because they know the French will be coming.

3.  Paul and Kat go foraging. (They are returning from the rear, so they should not be starving.)  Paul talks Kat into it.  Kat climbs over the wall of a farmstead to steal a goose.  He barely escapes and is fired on.  D  In the book, Kat is an ace scrounger.  He doesn’t need to be talked into it.  The goose is running around in a yard when Kat grabs it.  There is no encounter with a farmer.

4.  Kropp looks at a poster of a man and a woman.  He takes the woman half of the poster and hangs it in the trench.  D  In the book, Kropp and Baumer view the poster and banter about it.  Kropp tears the half with the man off and leaves the girl on the wall.

5.  Franz approaches three French girls and they invite him home.  End of scene.  He returns with a scarf.  F-  In the book, it is Paul, Kropp, and Lear who visit the girls.  The book covers the encounter with the girls while the boys are swimming and then covers them visiting the girls with food.  

6.  Paul is caught in a shell crater.  He stabs a French soldier several times and then is stuck with the dying man.  He tries stuffing his mouth with dirt, but the Frenchman lingers.  When Paul tries to deal with the wounds, the soldier dies.  He opens his billfold and learns he is a “typographer”.  F  In the book, the incident occurs at night when Paul is on patrol.  The scene has Paul apologizing to the corpse and promising to write his wife.  He thinks of the nature of war that made them enemies.

7.  The men demand twice the rations because they have half the men.  The cook gives it to them with hardly an argument.  D  In the movie, there is a much longer argument and an officer steps in to side with the hungry men

8.  After the war has been declared over, Paul and Kat go foraging to the same farm that they barely escaped from earlier in the movie.  Paul gets away with some eggs (instead of grabbing a duck) and runs with the farmer firing at them again.  When Kat goes into some woods to urinate, he encounters the farmer’s son, who shoots him in the chest.  Paul carries Kat to the hospital, but when he gets there Kat is proclaimed dead from loss of blood.  F  The war is nearing an end when Kat is hit in the leg with shrapnel.  Paul carries him to the hospital and is shocked to learn Kat is dead from a minor wound.  It turns out that Kat took another piece of shrapnel, this time in the head, while being carried.  This highlights the randomness of death and how you could survive all manner of dangers and yet die from bad luck

9.  The 2022 movie goes bombastic and it makes the title a joke.  Paul is killed in hand-to-hand combat in the last attack.  He dies right before the armistice.   C   In the book, Paul dies an undisclosed death near the end of the war.  The title of the book refers to his death.  Remarque is pointing out individual deaths were meaningless.  The 1930 version has him reaching for a butterfly and being killed by a sniper.  The 1979 has him sketching a bird when the sniper fires.   

 

As you can see, the few times the movie tries to replicate the book, it does so poorly.  Several of these scenes are not even crucial scenes from the book.  So, the decision to go with them instead of more iconic scenes is puzzling.  A third version of the book should have brought the novel to a new generation that is not familiar with the book or the two previous movies.  The film utterly fails in this respect.  Here are some crucial elements of the book that this version does not cover, but the other two movies did.

1.  There is not training camp sequence.  There is no Himmelstoss, who is a great villain.  Paul and his classmates are shown signing up and the next scene has them going to the front

2.  Paul does not go home on leave.  This sequence establishes the disconnect between the civilian world and the front.  Paul does not have his heart-tugging moments with his dying mother or his frustrating interaction with his father and his friends who argue about how to win the war.  He does not confront his teacher.  And we don’t get Paul feeling he is more at home at the front than in his hometown

3.  Paul and Albert do not spend time in a hospital where the plight of the wounded is highlighted.

4.  Kimmerich does not have his leg amputated in a ghastly hospital setting.  Mueller does not get his boots.  (In the 1930 version, the boots are passed on as each wearer is killed.  This version used a woman’s scarf for that.)

5. There is no battle where Paul takes refuge in a grave.

6.  There is no wounded horses scene.

7.  There is very little of the guys sitting around talking.

8.  There are no wounded crying out from no man’s land.

9.  Paul does not visit Kemmerich’s mother and lie to her about her son’s death.

10.  There is little character development.  The movie is totally dominated by Paul and Kat.  It is a buddy film.  Paul does not go from an enthusiastic fool to a wizened veteran.  He stays the same through the film.  In the book, Kat is mentor to all the men.  He is like their sergeant although he doesn’t have the rank.  In this movie, he is basically just an older soldier. 

 

But besides leaving out key scenes from the book, the movie replaces them with inferior scenes.  Of the 147 minute running time, about 20 minutes is devoted to either the diplomat Erzberger or Gen. Friedrichs.  Those 20 minutes would have been much better used to cover more of the book. 

Those who have read my reviews know that I am most upset when a war movie is unrealistic.  I don’t really care about bad accents and I don’t count rivets.  But I care deeply whether a movie makes sense.  This version had me shaking my head numerous times.  Obviously, most critics and viewers did not realize when the  movie was laughable or they don’t care.  So, if you don’t care, don’t read on.

1.  The movie opens with the Germans under fire in their trench.  It becomes clear that the French are attacking them, and yet, the Germans are ordered out of the trench to meet the French in no man’s land.  This does lead to a visceral melee that helps convince some that the movie is showing a realistic battle.  However, if the Germans were being attacked, they would not have left the trench.  Trenches were difficult to take, so why give up that advantage by leaving it? 

2.  The German bunkers were very well constructed.  The chances that the roof would collapse are very slim.  Paul is found in a hole with planks nicely arranged on top of him.  Hilarious

3.  After Paul is rescued, the scene shows Germans working outside the trench in daylight.  There would not have a been a truce to bury the dead in 1917.

4.  Bombardments would last up to a week. The movie shows them lasting minutes.  Veterans like Paul would not have panicked so easily.

5.  Franz would not have been the only one to go talk to the French women.

6.  There are long stretches where the unit is far away from the front.

7.  A whole company of new recruits died from poison gas.  Poison gas usually disabled, rather than killed.  Plus, no one was wounded?  They ALL died?

8.  They go over the top without a preparatory bombardment.  This would have been unlikely

9.  Tanks are shown counterattacking.  They were not usually used for this because it took a lot of time and effort to get them in position for an attack.  It would have been very bad luck for Paul and his comrades to attack an area that just so happened to be where a tank attack was planned.

10.  The tanks shown are the French Saint-Chamond, obviously chosen because they look bad-ass.  I won’t quibble about the fact that they were not being used in November, 1918.  They are rendered accurately.  A tank round hits in the trench from about 30 yards.  That trajectory would have been impossible.  A tank rolls into a communications trench. It would most likely have gotten stuck.  One reason for discontinuing the Saint-Chamond was its trouble crossing trenches.

11.  Paul and Kat bring food to the wounded Tjaden.  They don’t offer to feed him although he is lying on his back.  They take their eyes off him and he stabs himself with a fork.

12.  Paul and Kat go foraging even though they had just had a double ration.  They talk of going home and yet they risk that by targeting a French farm where they had barely survived before.  Suddenly there is snow covering the ground.

13.  The German soldiers celebrate the end of the fighting.  Suddenly, the general gives a speech from a balcony (thus reminding the soldiers of how out of touch all the generals were).  He starts by telling them soon they will be returning home, thus reinforcing their belief the war is over.  And then he incredibly makes a case for one more attack.  In fact, he orders it.  There is no way in hell all those men would have meekly gone to their deaths. Who wants to be the last to die in a lost war.  (Apparently Paul.)  The movie tries to get around this by having a few men shot for refusing, but the vast majority would have refused.  This was a classic mutiny scenario

14.  The general is a caricature of a WWI general.  Bald.  With a mean dog.  He lives in a chateau eating great food.  He loves war.  I think the general was a way for the director and screenwriter to emphasize the callous leadership in the war and the gulf between the soldiers and their generals.  However, this trope has appeared in many WWI movies, like “Paths of Glory”. 

15.  For the third time, we get an almost identical tracking shot of Paul running across no man’s land with men falling around him.  Once again, he takes shelter behind an object.  This time it’s a dead horse.  Once again, Paul has his face covered with mud.  He spends most of the combat scenes with mud on his face.  The movie has Paul and his mates in the same trench through the war.  By 1918 there would have been a lot more movement with the German offensive and then the Allied counteroffensive pushing them back.  The combat in the movie is more appropriate for 1916.

 

I know this is a lot of carping, but I had to get it off my chest.  If you like the movie, that is fine.  But don’t tell me it is a great war movie and don’t think you don’t need to read the book now.  I pity the high school students who use this movie to write a book report about “All Quiet on the Western Front.”

All Quiet on the Western Front (2022)

 

            Well, the day has finally arrived.  More than five years after I first heard of a remake of “All Quiet on the Western Front”, it is now streaming on Netflix.  It is a German film and is correctly entitled “Im Westen Nichts Neuss.”  This is appropriate because the novel by Erich Remarque is about German infantrymen in WWI.  The previous two versions – Lewis Milestone's Best Picture winner and the 1979 made-for-TV movie, were American pictures. Both did not show an American bias, but this new version promised to be better at showcasing the hardships German soldiers went through.  Edward Berger directed with an undisclosed, but probably hefty, Netflix budget.  Berger is a noted TV series director in Germany.  He co-wrote the screenplay.  The film was shot in Czechoslovakia.  It has been submitted by Germany for consideration for a nomination for Best Foreign Language Film at the next Oscars.

            The movie opens with a warning of “strong bloody war violence and grisly images”.  You had me at “bloody”.  A den of foxes in a woods shows the influence of Terance Malick (“The Thin Red Line”) on the cinematography (and the view that war does not harm wildlife and forests).  The camera moves to corpses littering no man’s land and then we are in the trench for a “Paths of Glory” journey through the trench pre-attack.  The over the top includes the oft-seen soldier killed as he climbs the ladder.  The “Paths” influence continues as we track a soldier named Heinrich as he avoids the random deaths to reach the French trench where he is last seen using his entrenching tool for hand-to-hand combat.  It’s a great combat scene, but sadly brief.  The revelation that Heinrich was killed starts a series of scenes moving his uniform from his corpse to women washing all the dead men’s uniforms to seamstresses repairing them to Paul (Felix Kammerer) and his school mates being handed them.  The boys are thrilled with their threads of glory.  The movie forgoes the usual boot camp segment to rush them to the front seemingly ill-prepared.  It is spring 1917.  Their first job is baling out the trench because of the constant rain.  Ludwig speaks for them all when he grumbles: “Somehow this is not how I imagined it.”  A sentiment soldiers of every war would agree with.

            The rest of the movie enlightens those who are not familiar with the Great War with scenes that reflect common soldier experiences.  The film makes an effort to bring something new to the table.  I mentioned the use of the entrenching tool as a weapon.  Paul has to collect dog tags from the dead.  A unit of replacements are victims of gas.  But for the most part, there is little that hasn’t been shown in other movies, especially the other two versions.  Davis clearly aimed his movie at Netflix viewers who would be seeing their second WWI movie (the other being “1917”).  The big difference is this film intercuts with the politics of the last part of the war.  Daniel Bruhl (who was originally tabbed for the Paul character but got aged out by the time production began) plays Matthias Erzberger, a Social Democrat (insert hissing from the generals) who is in contact with French Gen. Foch.  He is attempting to arrange an armistice.  This subplot necessitates Paul  making it to the end of the war.  This results in one of the worst endings of any prestigious war movie. 

            I recently watched the other versions of “All Quiet” for a comparison of scenes to each other and to the book.  I also listened to the book (the Audible version is outstanding).  It is one of my favorite novels and I have seen the movies at least four times each.  I couldn’t wait to add the new movie to my project.  Since the two earlier versions are both very good movies that cover the book well, I was intrigued to see how the new movie would handle the book.  Early word was that Davis’ version was outstanding and a worthy challenger to the other two.  The trailer had a lot of war movie fans salivating.  I am sorry to report you can towel off.

            I have had a hard time deciding how to approach this review.  Do I review it as a WWI movie or do I review it as an “All Quiet on the Western Front” movie?  So, I’ll do both.  As a WWI movie, it is logical to compare it to “1917”.  That film was overrated, but had the amazing cinematography to set it apart.  It is a much better movie than this movie.  The only strength is the combat scenes. One of them features French tanks and flamethrowers and is as graphic as the warning says.  This was an odd creative decision because if Davis meant his film to be the 21^st Century version of the novel brought to screen, he created an R-rated movie that students can not watch.  The rest of the movie has a poor flow to it.  Scenes end abruptly.  But the biggest problem is the Erzburger subplot brings the film to screeching halts whenever it leaves Paul and his mates.  My theory was the film did not want to lose its star Daniel Bruhl, so his lame political machinations were added.  Catastrophically, the creation of this subplot was responsible for the inexcusable final chapter for Paul.  (Think “We Were Soldiers”, but worse.)

            When I did my usual research, I looked at Wikipedia.  It says the movie has received “critical acclaim for faithfulness to the source material.”  You have got to be f’in kidding me.  If you were to see this movie with a different title, you would be hard-pressed to realize that it was another version of the novel.  Any student using this movie for a book report instead of reading the book will surely get a big fat F.  I would have to theorize that Davis watched the other two versions and decided he could not compete.  Of course, he could have taken the attitude that many haven’t seen the other two, so he would cover the main scenes and possibly better them.  Nope.  Other than Paul and Kat (Albrecht Schuch), the other characters barely register.  The movie is essentially a buddy film, not a buddies film.  Amazingly, most of the iconic scenes from the 1930 film are absent and some of the ones that are recreated are minor scenes. The few times that the movie uses the book, the scenes are far inferior to the other films.  For example, the charming liaison with the three French girls does not involve a river and only Frantz Muller goes!  The camera does not go with him.  My favorite scene did make it - Paul and the wounded Frenchman in the shell crater.  This being the 21^st Century, Paul stabs him 6 times!  The movie dispenses with Paul’s anguished response to what he has done.  Don’t hold your breath for the muddy field, the beat-down of Himmelstoss, the graveyard, Kimmerich’s boots (this movie moves a scarf from soldier to soldier), the Catholic hospital.  Paul does not return home on leave!  So much for contrasting the home front delusions with the realities of the front.  Instead, cover the disagreements between the generals and the politicians.  Yawn.

            As far as the acting, you will read some touting of Kammerer, but when you are out-acted by Richard Thomas…  The rest of the cast is not even well-known in Germany.  They must have saved money by cutting Himmelstoss, Kimmerich, Kantorek, Detering.  Kropp and Muller are blink and you miss them.  Bruhl is misused in a role that calls on him to mope. Technically the movie is eye-opening.  The combat features tracking shots and puts you in the middle of no man’s land.  The deaths are blood-chilling in their randomness.  When the soldiers reach the trench, all humanity is lost.  Wounded and unthreatening still gets you shot or bayoneted.  This is not a movie for children.  Although oddly, there is no swearing.

             I don’t want to discourage you from seeing the movie.  Watch it and make up your own mind.  Keep in mind this reviewer is very familiar with the previous movies and the book, so I am passionate about the subject. But I have seen hundreds of war movies and many WWI movies, so I feel I can weigh in on whether this movie holds up to the better movies in the subgenre.  If you have not seen "The Lost Battalion”, “Beneath Hill 60”, “Paths of Glory”, “Journey's End”, and “Gallipoli”, watch them ahead of this.  If you want a movie from the German perspective, try “Westfront 1918”.  And please watch the other two versions.

 

GRADE  =  C  (compared to other WWI movies)

GRADE =  F  (compared to 1930 & 1979)