Sights, sounds, and lots of dirt aid Oscar nominated WWI film ‘All Quiet on the Western Front’

HOLLYWOOD — The German war film “All Quiet on the Western Front” took home a total of seven BAFTA awards, including Best Film, Best Film Not in the English Language… along with best director, sound, cinematography, score and screenplay. Next up…The Oscars! “All Quiet on the Western Front” is nominated in nine categories.

The World War I drama tells a brutal story as seen through the eyes of a terrified young German soldier. The audio is, at times, visceral…and the visuals, harrowing.

“The book itself is hard to read and we wanted to represent the book as best as we could so, yeah, it’s–but it had to be told,” said Frank Petzold, visual effects.

“We noticed very quickly that it was important to also translate it with sound and kind of think about how he would hear the war and how it would sound to him, actually,” said Markus Stemler, sound design.

Some of the sound in the film also comes from the score: music representing the deadly scenes playing out on screen.

“And so finding the right language to make the film, you know, that everyone can interpret in its own way, it’s very difficult,” said Volker Bertelmann, original score.

The costumes were also a challenge. There were hundreds and hundreds of uniforms for the battle scenes alone. And when it came to the make-up, it was not your ordinary day on the job and provided quite a “dirty” challenge for Heike Merker.

“Yeah, definitely, but I liked the challenge. It was great and I really embraced it,’ said Merker. “That’s definitely not real dirt. It’s all make-up. This is made out of make-up products like pigments and then you can use, like, you can mix it with alcohol and with water and with grease and with Vaseline and with cream and all kind of stuff so, yeah, we used a lot of dirt… make-up dirt!”