Raymond Bernard’s 1932 film, Wooden Crosses is a key title in the history of the war film. From a personal perspective, its classification as such is a source of debate; historically, important films can have legendary status by being very modern in their construct, visual potency as well as by other means. Using Master of Cinema’s back catalogue as examples, Fritz Lang’s silent filmography, Madame Dubarry, Wings and highlights of Silent German Expressionism are all significantly important articles that transcend time. Wooden Crosses may not be as influential as the aforementioned, yet it still possesses a similar (yet less fashionable) reputation by merely being an early ringleader in the horror of war sub-genre.
Taking place at the back end of World War I, Bernard’s adaptation of a Roland Dorgelès novel follows a French platoon as they episodically move from one war zone to the next. Starting with hope, songs and camaraderie, the platoon triggered France’s enemy to retreat with minimal losses, a moment of reprieve in which Pierre Blanchar (Gilbert) joins the platoon. This gentle pace starts to become the norm with the squad moving from one place to the next with no resistance, a quietude that sees the men not shooting their guns for months at a time; a tranquillity that subsides to be replaced by the utter despair of the battlefield.
The centrepiece which the film builds towards takes up the second hour wherein the plucky platoon is torn asunder by a bombardment of canon-fire. An impressively staged set-piece conveyed by practical effects and scarily convincing stunt work
WOODEN CROSSES
This episodic approach pays dividends, with these capsules highlighting the life that was lost during the Great War. The highlight of the first hour is particularly potent, our ensemble of soldiers are pinned down by the faceless enemy planting mines nearby, a situation that is evaded by the passing of one shift to the next. The inevitable explosion is one of relief and distress, relief that the protagonists survived but distress with the replacement squad has been ordered to march to their deaths. The centrepiece which the film builds towards takes up the second hour wherein the plucky platoon is torn asunder by a bombardment of canon-fire. An impressively staged set-piece conveyed by practical effects and scarily convincing stunt work, a one/two that makes the film all the more credible.
The issue at the core of Wooden Crosses is articulation. The Wooden Cross is the perfect coda for wartime loss but the method director Bernard adopts is patently unambiguous. Overlaying soldiers carrying the burden of their own wooden cross as the other interlaced image sees the men march to the next battle. Such visuals are more evocative of an over-ripe propaganda piece than a dramatic probe into the senseless loss of life that the director was striving to depict. Furthermore, for a film seeking to arouse sympathy, the character work is scarce. The only vaguely memorable character lingers thanks to the heightened malice be passes on to the team that follows in his wake. Even the closest the film gets to a protagonist, Gilbert, is a nothing more than a cypher with little agency.
There is a debate to be made that Wooden Crosses depicts the ordinary nameless dead as retaliation to the cloying sentimentality found in heroic war pictures of the time. A very valid debate, actually. However, for that argument to hold any traction the issue of execution has to be addressed and Bernard’s direction doesn’t translate this message effective to a medium as dramatic as cinema. There are moments of savage beauty and hopeless suffocating loss, but for every such moment, there is another that rings hollow thanks to shrieking melodrama. A self-contradictory picture if ever there was one, but on the evidence of the countless things it does right – Wooden Crosses earns its pips.
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