Back At The Front Line example essay topic

All Quiet on the Western Front This movie captures the lives of young men and their experiences in the Great War. It shows the affects that the war had on them and how it changed their prospective on their own life. Every beginning has an end. As does this story. The movie begins with the boys finishing their schooling. It is almost symbolic as the boys leave the school laughing and joking with one another as if they are leaving their childhood behind.

The following day the boys enlist for war. They begin their training to become soldiers immediately. Under the tutelage of Corporal Himmelstoss, the boys undergo grueling drills in the mud and freezing cold. The boys get Corporal Himmelstoss back for his heartless manner.

Late in the night they attack the intoxicated Corporal and leave him in a humiliated state. This shows the boys still posses their childlike humor and antics. The next day the boys march out in flawless order ready for war. As the do so new recruits are being marched in. As the boys wait to board the trains they get their first glimpse of war and it's affects.

Wounded soldiers are ushered out, now they see how destructive the war can be. The day they arrive to the front they are placed on patrol. They are led by Katczinsky, or Kat as he is referred to. Kat is older and wiser; the boys trust and follow him. On the front they are attacked with bombs and gun shots.

The cry of the horses disturbs them. At once they become men. As time progress conditions become more apparent. Huge rats nauseate them and they can hardly eat the already sickening food.

On the front gas is the most feared. All around them their classmates are being killed, each person's chances are becoming fewer. The new recruits are as young as 16 and die because of inexperience. Their days continue on a rotation of; under fire in the trenches rest back to the trenches and so on. They are desperate for decent food. One day they spot some wild geese in a frantic attempt, the men run like mad to catch them.

After catching them they all gather together at their feast, talking about home and what they will do when they get back. They need things like this, distractions. So that they don t become so wrapped up in the fighting that they forget they are human. Another distraction is shown later in the film, when the boys meet three French women.

In battle (the men) become wild beast, murders on the front line, this line is cited by Paul Baumer. He proclaims that you can smell blood. It takes a night watching another human for Paul to realize we are all the same. They are all human, and they are killing each other.

After this Paul must detach himself from that thinking. Each man who came to the war as a boy was affected physically and emotionally on the front line. The boys all attended school together. Josef Behm was the first of their classmates to die.

The war took away everyone's optimism. Before Behm's death they knew he wouldn t survive. He was in much pain and it all of his friends witnessed it. His death made the war more personal, because now the other men realized that war could kill them as well. Franz K emmerich had a wound to the leg that became fatal.

At first others said he was lucky because it was only his leg. It would have to be amputated and everyone knew he would not be back to battle. Another infection spread through him though and killed him. Instead of encouraging words before his death, his friends urged him to give them his boots.

They could not lie to themselves or each other; hopefulness was not part of the boys lives anymore. Before his death Kimmerich gave his boots to another schoolmate. Deterring another student disappears from the camp. They hear no more information concerning him except that he has been caught by the military police on his way back to Germany. They do however know the consequence for trying to leave is death. Paul Baumer and Albert Kropp are close friends; so close it seems ironic that both become injured at the same time.

Paul regains his health again but it seems Albert may not. He pleas with Paul to get him a gun so that he may kill himself. He feels things are so bad and knows nothing will be the same that death would be the best solution. Paul himself is sent back home for leave time to recuperate. While away Muller, another companion of the men is killed in battle. After a short time Paul returns to the front line.

Soon after he joins the battle again Leer is shot and killed. Paul is the only one of the schoolmates alive and fighting on the front line. He is now the experienced one. Kat is gone he was shot in the head. Paul is the leader to a bunch of inexperienced kids right now. While writing a note to Albert Paul is shot in the head and immediately dies.

The war may have killed all of the men who were schoolmates but they were not the same boys who enlisted together. When Paul goes back home we get to see really how different of a person he is in contrast to the person he was before he left. He tries looking the same will make him feel the same way he did before he left. When he is home he feels he has to protect everyone back home by lying to them about how it really is on the front line. When they ask him how great it is, he doesn t try to argue with them he just sits there. Before he left he told Franz's mother that he would take care of him, so now he feels it's his duty to tell her how Franz died.

He did not however tell her the truth; instead he tells her his death was quick and painless, the complete opposite to how he really died. Back at the front line no one lies to another. There is more understanding with fellow soldiers then blood family. Also Paul's mother has cancer so he doesn t want to worry her anymore then she has already. So he tells her that when he returns to war he will not go back to the front line, he will seek out a safer job. No one back at home can understand the war is not the glorious war everyone thinks it is.

They don t understand what the war has done to all the boys. It has made them sad and pessimistic. You can see it when Paul says there is no meaning to life the hopelessness he has obtained while he has been in the war has changed his thinking. He feels his home is no longer his home either. He says the war and the front line is his real home. Even when Paul returns to the front line and tries to sum up he everything that has occurred he still can make any sense of it all.

Out of the 20 of his friends that enlisted thirteen are dead, four missing, and one is in a mad house. You can see what a different person Paul is as he smokes his cigarettes. The change is subtle but in the beginning he said he didn t smoke. This movie shows a different side to war.

Like Paul's family we may believe war is glorious and a great way to show our dedication to our country. In truth war even if you may survive it can leave lasting affects in a person.