All Quiet on the Western Front – Cinema Sundays!

All Quiet on the Western Front

Released by Universal Studios  in 1930, All Quiet on the Western Front was based on the novel Im Westen Nichts Neues by Erich Maria Remarque (Berlin, 1929), directed by Lewis Milestone and stars Louis Wolheim, Lew Ayres, John Wray, Arnold Lucy and Ben Alexander.  All Quiet on the Western Front was the first to win the Academy Awards for both Outstanding Production and Best Director and was nominated for Best Writing and Best Cinematography.  In 1937, a sequel was made, The Road Back, in showing members of the 2nd Company returning home after the war then in 1979, All Quiet on the Western Front was made into a television film starring Richard Thomas and Ernest Borgnine.

From AFI.com about All Quiet on the Western Front:
“Paul Bäumer, a young German schoolboy, along with his friends, is inspired by his schoolmaster to “save the Fatherland” and joins the Kaiser’s forces. Their illusions are soon dispelled, however, by the cruel realities of battle, relieved only by a brief romantic interlude with some French farm girls and the humorous interjections of Katz and Tjaden. When Paul, the only survivor of the group, returns home, he finds the professor still haranguing his young scholars to join the conflict; and when Paul denounces this attitude, he is proclaimed a coward by the youths. Tiring of the false impression of war at home, he returns to the front to instruct his new comrades in warfare. As the sole survivor of this group also, Paul reaches over the top of a trench to catch a butterfly and is killed by an enemy sniper. … Quiet reigns on the front lines. “

View a clip from the movie: