The first teaser trailer for Netflix’s All Quiet on the Western Front, the first German-language adaptation of German author Erich Maria Remarque’s well-known World War I novel, begins with those words.
The first look at Edward Berger’s movie can be found exclusively here. The movie will have its international premiere on September 12 at the Toronto Film Festival in 2022.
It is immediately apparent that this is not your normal battle film. Shots of brutality and fear in the trenches are intercut with scenes of the young troops eagerly going to the front.
Lewis Milestone turned Remarque’s 1928 book into an English-language movie that won Oscars for best picture and best director in 1930. Milestone based the film adaptation on his personal experiences in the trenches. Richard Thomas and Ernest Borgnine were the stars of an English-language Emmy-winning television adaption from 1979. For the first time, the novel has been adapted in its original German thanks to Berger’s Netflix movie. Paul Bäumer, a front-line soldier, is portrayed by newcomer Felix Kammerer, and his comrade-in-arms Stanislaus Katczinsky by System Crasher’s Albrecht Schuch. In the last days of the war, German actor Daniel Brühl portrays a diplomat negotiating Germany’s surrender.
Germany has chosen All Quiet on the Western Front to represent the nation in the Best International Feature category of the 2023 Oscars. The Netflix film will be released in a few cinemas after its TIFF debut in Germany on September 29, the UK on October 14, and the United States, beginning with an exclusive engagement at New York’s Paris Theater on October 7 and spreading to a few locations on October 14. On October 28, All Quiet on the Western Front will be released on Netflix globally.
View the trailer here.
