1/20/23 - All Quiet on the Western Front (2022) - 7+/8-/10

The latest in the evolving dominant look of war on screen (Saving Private Ryan -> Dunkirk -> 1917 -> AQOTWF), it demands your attention and respect. Though theoretically used as a brace, it felt more like a Pavlovian war whistle, the rhapsodic synth inspired 3-note motif energizes both the viewer and the scene. It preps you for the impending intensity, and the film packs that in in spades.

The look of the film is grimdark but not blackly saturated like so many of the films as of late. You can see every speck of dirt and blood blasting around and every mud dried curl of the slowly changed gaunt visage of Felix Kammerer. The whole looks extraordinary and becomes an endurance challenge as the war rips at the protagonists soul with the crushing weight of war. It isn’t as bleak as something like a Come and See, but the point is still capitalized deftly and the tale told with energy and skill by the director & crew.

It is technically outstanding and breathes a dying vigor into the celluloid whisper of a conflict long past, but ever present.