A little more art (always as opposed to artifice or the arty) could have heightened the beauty and truth of this film, which already has as much as we’ve seen anywhere this year.

It's a smart choice and a peerless film that makes sweeping rhetorical statements about the futility of war while maintaining a laser-sharp focus on an ensemble of meticulously drawn characters.

The greatest World War I movie ever made (and there were lots of good ones)...

In 1952, both Orson Welles and David Lean cited this as one of their 10 all-time favorite films. Still, not everyone was a fan: Joseph Goebbels, Hitler's rat-faced Minister of Propaganda, declared it "Cinematic Public Enemy No. 1."