All Quiet on the Western Front

I have not disliked a movie in such a long time like this.

Decent cinematography and lead performances wasted on a flat script that prioritizes looking and acting deep and smart when all it is is violence. War is violence, yes but its such a lame layer of war.
We know what war is, we know how war works. Its not pretty but to translate that into a cinematic language, there is allot you can do then just tell your audience that "war bad" which this movie is and nothing else.

I would say its had allot of parallels with elem klimov's 1985 masterpiece come and see. In both we meet a kid/teenager ready to go to war as we see his descent into madness, facial expression and body language.
But in come and see its the little details that make it so special. We see flyora's family for a moments but always in agony. Setting a tone up that we as the audience know but he doesn't.
In berger's film we know nothing about our main character, we don't know anything about anyone.
Come and see is beautifully as its focus and narrative is on one thing and one character. It uses that as to destroy the innocence inside him.
Its not afraid to kill children or woman because the reality of war is that no one is save from it but allot of films including all quiet at the western front do.

In come and see there is a clear transformation in emotion in flyora. It culminates in rage.
But paul isn't interesting emotionally at all. At the end there is a sort of parallel again, Paul is dead but a younger looking boy is framed center in the camera before the film ends. Come and see has flyora still alive but near the end has a scene where a similar looking boy, similaire to how he dressed and looked in the beginning of the film stands next to him.
Come and see also just shows instead of tells. I think all quiet on the western front has a boring fucking script and it doesn't help that its like 2 and a half hours long.

All Quiet on the Western Front2022

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