All quiet on the Western Front (1930)

All quiet on the Western Front was made in 1930 and directed by Lewis Milestone. This black and white film tells the story of a group of young men, from being encouraged to join the army by their teacher right through to their deaths at war.
Although not as theatrical and humorous as "Oh! What a lovely war" I liked how small sparks of humour were injected into this film from the soldiers' dialogue about their lives at war.

I thought that this film was very effective in showing what life was like in the trenches. Also, watching some of the soldiers go insane was really harrowing for me to watch & the film's brutal honesty in portraying the war is the reason I think it has been so successful. Originally a book, All quiet on the Western Front has been made into several films, TV dramas and even Daniel Radcliffe is to star in another remake which is not due to be released until 2013.

Although it made us laugh, this was one of the images stuck in my mind long after the film had finished. 

I noticed that a few scenes were shot from behind windows, like we are on the inside looking out at this war. I thought it was quite effective and provided nice visual frames throughout the film.
I also liked the section in the film showing the journey of one man's boots. At the start of the film a soldier is telling the men about his brand new boots. Towards the end of the film he dies and the boots are passed onto the next soldier. This continues until Paul (the main character) acquires them. I thought this was a really nice sequence in the film because something as unimportant as boots meant a great deal to the soldiers. The boots could also symbolise the soldiers themselves, the journey they have been on and how insignificant they seemed in the grand scheme of things but really every one of them were very important.

Overall, I think that this film is very effective in demonstrating what life was like for the soldiers in World War 1. The props and setting helped me with this project as I looked at how the soldiers used them & thought about how a villager might have used them differently.