Synopsis
When a group of idealistic young men join the German Army during World War, they are assigned to the Western Front, where their patriotism is destroyed by the harsh realities of combat.
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Cast
- Louis WolheimStanislas 'Kat' Katczinsky
- Lew AyresPaul Bäumer
- John WrayHimmelstoss
- Arnold LucyKantorek
- Ben AlexanderFranz Kemmerich
- Scott KolkLeer
- Owen Davis Jr.Peter
- Walter RogersBehn
- William BakewellAlbert Kropp
- Russell GleasonMueller
Recommendations
- 100
Variety
A harrowing, gruesome, morbid tale of war, so compelling in its realism, bigness and repulsiveness that Universal’s Western Front becomes at once a money picture. - 100
Slant Magazine
Anti-war statements of the cinema in the subsequent 80 years have occasionally surpassed Lewis Milestone’s technically and artistically groundbreaking film, but few can match it for relentless despair or elemental fury—both on and off the battlefield. - 100
TV Guide Magazine
Perhaps the greatest antiwar film ever made, holding considerable power even now due to Lewis Milestone's inventive direction. - 100
Empire
Despite a little dating around the edges this is a truly superb example of its genre and a cinema classic. - 90
The Guardian
It is the most thoroughgoing exposé of the absurdity of war, and the most explicitly pacifist movie ever made. - 90
The New York Times
Often the scenes are of such excellence that if they were not audible one might believe that they were actual motion pictures of activities behind the lines, in the trenches and in No Man's Land. - 88
Chicago Reader
Lewis Milestone's powerful 1930 adaptation of Erich Maria Remarque's antiwar novel, starring Lew Ayres and Louis Wolheim, deserves its reputation as a classic. - 88
ReelViews
All Quiet on the Western Front is the definitive World War I motion picture, the best of a surprisingly small class of movies.
