The measure for all anti-war cinema: All Quiet on the Western Front

The bitterness expressed in some of the war films of the late 1920s reflected the war memoirs and novels published in the years 1928 to 1930. Although works of disillusionment had begun to appear earlier, the numbers published, and the immediate elevation of some to classic status, indicated that anti-war sentiments represented the spirit of the times. Edmund Blunden’s Undertones of War, Frederic Manning’s Her Privates We, Arnold Zweig’s The Case of Sergeant Grischa, Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms, Richard Aldington’s Death of a Hero and Siegfried Sassoon’s Memoirs of an Infantry Officer, all contained a more realistic view of trench combat than had appeared before, telling readers of the futility and brutality of conflict and promoting the necessity of preventing another war.