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The Arrival of SoundFilm 6 of 12
Westfront 1918
Westfront 1918: Vier von der Infanterie
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G. W. Pabst, Nero-Film, 1930, after Ernst Johannsen's Vier von der Infanterie. Four German soldiers in the trenches of the Western Front: a leave in France, a return, the line. Early German sound used for artillery and overlapping talk, not speeches. Pabst shot studio trenches and locations so the explosions sit in the same frame as the faces. The Nazi regime banned it in 1933 as damaging to national morale. Often paired with All Quiet on the Western Front (also 1930) as that year's other major film to treat the infantry as exhausted men, not emblems.
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The gap is a wounded man breathing after the artillery stops. Pabst records the front as overlap, not speeches, and the explosions sit in the same frame as the faces. Banned in 1933 as bad for morale. Listen for the quiet. It is the loudest thing in the film.
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