All Quiet on the Western Front

Edward Berger’s German production marches schoolboys who have just volunteered into the trenches, and runs the armistice delegation alongside them. That second strand is not in Remarque. Berger’s reason: Remarque wrote a century ago, before the Second World War, which a director now can see. The novel was written in German, yet Lewis Milestone’s 1930 film and Delbert Mann’s 1979 television version were in English; Berger shot his in German. Lesley Paterson and Ian Stokell optioned the novel in 2006 and held it sixteen years; Paterson says each renewal cost ten to fifteen thousand dollars, paid from triathlon winnings. They filmed in Prague on a disused airfield. James Friend describes his instinct as putting the 65mm camera inside a narrow trench and opening the space out from there. Volker Bertelmann played the recurring figure on a family harmonium, cut his draft from four notes to three, then pushed those through a large amplifier with the bass boosted. Nine Oscar nominations brought four wins: international feature, cinematography, original score and production design. Berger got no directing nomination, while BAFTA gave him best director among seven wins from fourteen nominations. A good fit if you treat the cutting between the front and the railway carriage as the real subject. Not for you if you want the novel scene by scene.