A look at the final months of World War I. Criterion Collection Year 1930 Video Release 2018-01-30 Studio Criterion Collection Genre Drama MPAA Rating Not Rated Color Color Runtime 96 Animated Live-Action Full Synopsis G. W. Pabst brought the war movie into a new era with his first sound film, a mercilessly realistic depiction of the nightmare that scarred a generation, in the director's native Germany and beyond. Digging into the trenches with four infantrymen stationed in France in the final months of World War I, Pabst illustrates the harrowing ordeals of battle with unprecedented naturalism, as the men are worn away in body and spirit by firefights, shelling, and the disillusion that greets them on the home front. Long unavailable, the newly restored Westfront 1918 is a visceral, sobering antiwar statement that is as urgent today as when it was made. Director G.W. Pabst Cast G.W. Pabst; Fritz Kampers; Gustav Diessl; Hans-Joachim Mobis; Claus Clausen; Jackie Monnier; Hanna Hoessrich; Else Heller