When “All Quiet on the Western Front” premiered in September, few could have predicted its aggressive Oscar campaign. The German‑language World War I film arrived on Netflix alongside a slate of higher‑budget prestige titles—Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Oscar‑winning “Bardo” and the star‑studded “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery.” While those films have largely faded from awards conversation, each earning only a single nomination, “All Quiet” has emerged as a frontrunner, garnering nine Oscar nods, including a coveted Best Picture slot.
Director Edward Berger described the response as “a wave of joy and luck” just days before the film swept seven BAFTA awards, including Best Film. “We’re very grateful for that… it’s a German war movie!” he told AFP. This adaptation is the third screen version of Erich Maria Remarque’s seminal novel, but the first filmed in the author’s native language. Berger said he would have immediately declined to make another English‑language version. The decision to “flip the script” was bolstered by Netflix’s recent success in global markets with subtitled hits such as South Korea’s “Squid Game” and the Oscar‑winning “Roma.”
The film’s $20 million budget was modest for Netflix yet substantial for the German industry. “We wouldn’t have gotten the type of budget that you need to make this film five years ago,” Berger noted. Its Best Picture nomination marks the first time a German‑language movie has achieved that honor. Ironically, the film has been received more warmly abroad than in German‑speaking regions, where many critics lambasted it for deviating from Remarque’s text—a work that has sold 50 million copies worldwide and was famously banned by the Nazis.
Berger’s changes include portraying tense armistice peace talks with French generals and omitting a scene in which a war‑hardened hero returns home but cannot readjust to civilian life. “I don’t follow it very closely… that’s part of the journalist’s job—to observe, criticize,” he said, adding that he felt “licensed to make those changes” because “why make it the same?” He illustrated the stark contrast in reception with a harrowing scene near the film’s end where a key character is bayoneted in the back. At the Toronto world premiere, the audience gasped—a reaction Berger did not anticipate. In Germany, he explained, “as Germans, we expect—in a German movie about war—you cannot have a hero. You cannot have people be successful in the mission. You almost cannot have a soldier survive.” By contrast, American audiences “are used to the hero… you want them to come out positively, and you cling to the hope that your hero is going to change the world.”
Berger emphasized that his motivation was not patriotic. Both the film and Remarque’s anti‑war novel reject jingoism. “We wanted to make a very German movie—but we are not making it for the country,” he said. “I’m not a patriot. Germans have a difficult relationship with patriotism, pride, or honor about their history or country. So I’m not in that business.” Filming in German provided “an outer stamp of authenticity” and deepened the sense of “shame and responsibility and guilt” many Germans feel about their history.
Regardless of the outcome on March 12, “All Quiet on the Western Front” has left a lasting impression on Academy voters. It is a shoo‑in for Best International Feature, a strong contender for Best Picture, and its nine nominations are one short of the all‑time record for a foreign‑language film. “Were we surprised? Of course,” Berger admitted. “I mean, you can’t count on something like that.”
Comments are closed for this story.