Im Western nichts Neues (There is nothing new on the Western Front, 2022) directed by Edward Berger was the big winner at this year’s BAFTAs, taking home seven awards, including Best Picture and Best Director. And how well-deserved these trophies are.

The latest adaptation of the novel of the same name by the German writer Erich Maria Remarque is real tour de force which throws us into the third year of the First World War, in the midst of the battle between the Germans and the French on the Western Front. The opening shots quickly and brutally delineate the subject of war from the point of view of the soldiers at the front and the total dehumanization it causes: commanders shouting at the top of their lungs badly! badly! badly! (“Go! Go! Go!”), pushing soldiers out of trenches in front of bullets, trucks filled with corpses, frozen fields on which dead soldiers are scattered like broken dolls, the path of military uniforms from the bodies of the dead at the front to the laundry and finally , to other soldiers.

A book is an imaginary experience and limited by what we can or want to imagine, but a film is a visual and auditory experience, which means we force ourselves to perceive stimuli completely foreign to our minds. If Remarque’s novel allows us to breathe between pages, scenes and even words, the film comes at us with the full weight of an avalanche that makes us desperately seek respite, a breath of air.

But the respite does not come, because outside the cinematographic art and the political vision of interstate conflicts, an image of war is formed as a tension between the state and its own people, an image that poses questions to the viewer. such as: does the state have the right to sacrifice citizens for offensive or even defensive purposes? Is war (and the sacrifices it entails) part of the social contract that the citizen has with the state? What part does the state want to protect, if not the one that gives it legitimacy, namely the people?

Nothing new on the front. There is nothing new in war

The visual impression remains constant throughout the film, nothing disrupting the gray landscapes in the foreground, nothing penetrating the paralyzing cold. Mud – a mixture of earth, rain and blood – is everywhere, as is death: on the fields, on the uniforms, on the faces of the young people, even in the mouth of the French soldier that Paul Boehmer tries to strangle. Whether they die in the trenches or on the field, all meet their end in the morass of death. Often, the film sinks into a deathly silence that gives the mind a break to absorb the visuals. Nature itself has sunk into a grave silence where the only acceptable form of existence seems to be waiting – waiting for the next attack, the next bullet, the next fallen comrade, the next encounter with death.

Visual and auditory stagnation and numbness reflects, like the name, stagnation in the front. Nothing new, because during the four years of the war, the western front line hardly moved. This is nothing new, as the fighting that resulted in the deaths of more than three million soldiers was often fought at a distance of a few hundred or only tens of meters. This is nothing new, because on the Western Front the quintessence of war was a political and conceptual weapon: to sacrifice one’s own people for nothing. But this aspect is not a novelty in the history of wars, which is closely and inevitably connected with the history of mankind.

As a living organism, the state will do everything possible for its own survival, preservation and promotion of its own interests. Despite the fact that the state is greater than the sum of its constituent elements – people, territory and government – ​​the human element predominates in the state. So, while the state can be seen as a political entity with its own existence and will, it is ultimately a creation and reflection of man and, implicitly, of human nature with its weaknesses and qualities. But man and his nature remain for the most part inscrutable, and all we have at hand to try to understand them is speculation. We can, for example, assume, like Rousseau, that man is inherently good and that war is simply the result of unfortunate circumstances, or, like Hobbes, assume that man is inherently bad and that war is inevitable. But in both cases, war seems to be perceived almost as a necessity and even the norm. There is nothing new, then, in the fact that the population is engaged in an unprovoked and unwanted struggle, or that soldiers die because of the decisions of a few individuals, or that the existence of an individual is inferior to the existence of a state. . As Vonnegut would say in his novel Slaughterhouse five: “That’s how things go.”

Any war, outside the personal ambitions of political leaders, has a utilitarian character or is presented as having a utilitarian purpose. Whether one goes to war for resources, territory, or ideals, the argument is always that in the long run, and assuming victory, the majority will be wealthier (in the case of the offensive) or at least as wealthy as they are now (in the case of the defensive ). “Good” is presented as the ultimate goal, the motto by which the state and its army must do right. However, political realism claims that what is related to the political sphere, including war, should not and cannot be evaluated from a moral point of view. Through the political, the state ensures its existence, promotes its interests and demonstrates its power, and to impose a moral perspective on a political subject is like morally evaluating a virus whose only goal is to survive, even if this involves colonizing other organisms.

Who is fighting whom?

The film presents us with a gradual and inevitable dehumanization. We follow Paul Baumer in all his innocence, with all the enthusiasm to protect his country and the altruism to help his comrade with a gas mask in critical situations. But the situation is rapidly deteriorating. “A man is a beast,” a soldier says to Pavlov on his first day at the front and offers him a drink, anticipating the future. Indeed, the two hours of the film that follow show us how man is reduced to his animal nature, driven by the instinct of survival. The war is not only of the French against Germans, but also the mind against survival instinct, humanity against animal husbandry The internal struggle of the soldier is at least as violent as the external struggle at the front, and all this is masterfully depicted in the scene where Paul stabs a French soldier and tries to strangle him by stuffing dirt into his mouth, only to understand, the moment of realizing the enormity of what he has done and attempts to save him.

Soldier Paul Boehmer, a symbol of humanity that has survived despite all the dehumanizing circumstances, dies a few minutes before the armistice from a bayonet that tears open his chest as indifferently and quickly as young men going to the front become beasts. The end of Pavel comes as a result of the desire of the commanders to achieve victory in the last hundred meters, despite the truce that had already been agreed and signed. “It’s not the individual that matters, but the whole,” the commander shouts to the soldiers, reminding us of the cynicism of the situation and the value of the individual only as part of the whole. Or who is the enemy of the soldier in this situation? Which parties are involved in the war?

Charles Tilly reminds us of this with his aphorism war created the state, and the state created war (“the war created the state, and the state created the war”). The statement fits into Tilley’s broader vision, according to which a state has the right and duty to defend its territory and population in the event of a threat. This occupation of the state is at the same time the justification of its own existence, which can lead to situations where the state invents danger in order to demonstrate its usefulness and power to the people. Numerous examples from the real world seem to confirm Tilly’s theory and outline the image of the state as an entity strongly striving for self-preservation, even at the risk of endangering its own people.

State, Max Weber tells us in his lecture Politics as a vocation, is the only organization that has a monopoly on the legal use of violence and physical coercion. In other words, the state has the power and legitimacy to use physical coercion, such as imprisonment or even the death penalty, to compel a person to perform certain tasks, such as paying taxes, obeying the law, or enlisting in the army. The counterargument to Weber’s vision stems precisely from the element of legitimacy given to the state by the people. The limits of violence and coercion can be established even by the citizens of the respective state or by other branches of government in the state in accordance with the principle a system of checks and balances. Thus, we can conclude that the people, at least in theory, have the power not only to resist conscription, but also to deprive the state of the power to compel the population to participate in war or to punish desertion. Mostly they try to do this through anti-war protests of civil society, but without noticeable results. Even the mass protests against the Vietnam War, which are said to have forced Nixon to end the invasion in 1973, did not affect US military strategy in Southeast Asia or lead to legislative change. The people, a key element in the legitimization of the state, lose their own power, and we can only assume that the individual can find some freedom within the limits imposed by the state.

We can, for example, fall into the existentialist trap and claim, as Sartre did, that the individual is always free (even doomed to freedom) and therefore free to choose. Theoretically, a soldier can choose whether to go into battle, whether to kill his enemy or let him be killed, whether to follow the orders of his superiors, etc. Even inaction is a choice, and the only way out is death. But to what extent can we talk about freedom and autonomy of decision-making in the event of war, if the means by which the state manages to build an army are coercion, propaganda and manipulation? The freedom and autonomy of decision-making presupposes the existence of a mind that makes them conscious, that filters options and recognizes limitations. But is there anything left of freedom or reason at the front, in a situation where every minute is a struggle for one’s own life and everything boils down to the biological instinct of survival and preservation? Or when young minds are manipulated by war propaganda?

We helplessly watch the whole charade put on by the state to convince the youth it is supposed to protect to attract. Stories and persuasive speeches by military and political leaders are built around the concept honor – a vague concept, most likely meaningless to the mind, which just arose in childhood, but is sold because of the weight of its content. It is honor that drives Paul and his friends to lie about their age and forge their parents’ signatures, and it is also honor that sends them to their deaths moments before the truce. But what the film shows us is the exact opposite of honor – the cowardice and contempt of political leaders, the fear and savagery of soldiers. The trenches, the front and the war are the last places where we could find honor.

The soldiers’ narrative of a terrifying enemy that must be defeated at any cost, whether offensive or defensive, quickly erodes as the film progresses. All heroes simultaneously become victims and executioners, innocent and guilty. The enemy is no longer only the opposing side, but also their own superiors, who push them in the face of bullets without logic or success. The war is no longer German against French, but state against citizens Read the entire article and comment on contributors.ro