All Quiet On The Western Front (1930)

Long before Saving Private Ryan or Platoon made people think about the value of warfare All Quiet On The Western Front set the standard for anti-war films. In the decades that have passed since it was released it has not lost its impact due to Lew Ayres performance or Lewis Milestone's direction. The acting is extremely over the top but this is due to filmmaking just coming out of the silent era when actors had to be very expressive to get their point across without sound. It is also very violent compared to the films that followed it up until the 1960s. The camera work is shakey and perhaps even crudely filmed but this now gives it the feel of the Great War newreels. Lew Ayres plays the main character perfectly from the idealistic student at the start of the film until the emtionally batered shell of a man in the shocking final scene. It is an important film that shocked audiences in 1930 and continues to do so today. The 1930 review by Variety sums it up ""All Quiet On the Western Front" cost Universal $1,200,000. The League of Nations could make no better investment than to buy up the master print, reproduce it in every language for every nation to be shown every year until the word War shall have been taken out of the dictionaries."