‘All Quiet on The Western Front’ Movie Reflection

In what is one of the most visually stunning movies to capture World War I since “1917”, which in itself may go down as one the most epic one-shot movies of all time, “All Quiet on The Western Front”, based on the similarly titled book, delivered what we have those in our time have always wanted to see, yet terrified of so at the same time, trench-warfare that so embodied WWI in its most primal form.

The story arc at first glimpse follows a 17-year-old boy who forges his father’s signature to enlist alongside his three friends to fight for their country. But, as he is subsequently sent off to fight on the western front of the war, a battlefield riddled with trenches, what unfolds is an endless waltz of life and death. We weren’t watching Paul, the protagonist, but the storyline of nearly every young man who went off to fight on the western front of the war, where the Allied and Central commanders sent off millions to their death, despite the battle line barely shifting from its initial location at the war’s end.

This endless waltz was so perfectly captured by the recycling of uniforms from the dead to the living, where the clothes were patched up to render the location of death on the body a mere ghost of the past. And as Paul received his “new” uniform upon enlisting, his naivety barely escaped the name patch of the former wearers on it.

But the most significant piece of the film may have been the transgression of a man thrust into those trenches. Over what seemed like a short period, Paul went from being innocent to horrified, to a killer, to mortified, to degraded, to lifeless, and ultimately, to a man stripped of every ounce of his being charging towards his death, killing all in his path, until his expected demise.

Unfortunately for Paul, but fortunately for the man who would have undoubtedly assumed his uniform afterward, the armistice of 11 November 1918 went into place merely a minute after a bayonet pierced his heart and he took his rightful place alongside his brothers-in-arms that all died before him.

Paul set out to prove his courage to fight in the war, for his country, his family, and his friends, and he did so with incredible bravery in the face of inevitable mutilation and death. Still, he was reduced to a mere figment of his past self in the process.

The next time I find myself struggling to get through something challenging, or if I find myself seemingly too exhausted to stay on task, especially as I try to push the limits of what’s possible in each day as a full-time stay-at-home father, I will think of Paul, of every man who found themselves tossed into those trenches. And I will undoubtedly press on with my day. For it’s hard to comprehend much worse of a fate, let alone still pressing on through it while seeing the blood already on the wall.