A bit of classic melodrama with a decidedly anti-spin, successfully couched in the horrors of war instead of the sentimentality of fighting.
But, it is melodrama nevertheless. The boys we meet are young and sweet, they go to fight and fall. We learn a lesson that war is bad. We learn a lesson that being a man isn't all it's trumped up to be.
Of course, for 1930 it was a different message than today. We don't, for instances, have trenches in Iraq, and the army has better communications and supply chains, right?
But imagine being in the theater in the 1930s in Germany watching this, and Nazi's--not yet in power--would open the doors and release rats into the theater and yell.
But still, it's propaganda. Pro war, anti war, it's all about the message and not the complexity of the message.
So, class, we have learned that war is bad. Except when it isn't. Which is whenever it's needed to not be. Remember that, and then no movie can tell you what to think and feel. You'll need brave democratically elected leaders for that challenging role.
Where we saw it: DVD | We deign to rate it: 69 outta 100