The Road Back
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The Road Back (German: Der Weg zurück) is a novel by German author Erich Maria Remarque, written in 1931. It details the experience of young men in Germany who have returned from the trenches of World War I and are trying to integrate back into society. Although the book follows different characters from those in All Quiet on the Western Front it can be assumed that they were in the same company, as Ludwig briefly recalls Müller, Kat, Haie, and Bäumer. The book can be considered to come chronologically after All Quiet on the Western Front and before Three Comrades. Its most salient feature is the main characters' pessimism about contemporary society which, they feel, is morally bankrupt because it has allegedly caused the war and apparently does not wish to reform itself.
The Road Back was adapted into a motion picture in 1937 and directed by James Whale. It was one of Whale's last films for Universal Pictures. It starred among others, Noah Beery, Jr. and Richard Cromwell.
The book was banned during Nazi rule. When the film was made, Universal Pictures was threatened with a boycott of all their films by the German government unless the anti-Nazi sentiments in the script were watered down. Carl Laemmle and his son, Carl Laemmle, Jr., the former heads of Universal, had recently been ousted by a corporate takeover. The new studio heads, fearing a financial loss, caved in to the pressure and edited the film before releasing it, much to director James Whale's displeasure. Disgusted with the studio's cowardice under its new management, Whale left Universal after completing Wives Under Suspicion, an unsuccessful remake of his own The Kiss Before the Mirror. He returned 3 years later to direct Green Hell, but never made another film for Universal after that.
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