'Better Not to Die at All': The Battles of 'All Quiet on the Western Front'

On 5 December 1930, the actor (and, later, director) Leni Riefenstahl attended a Berlin screening of a new war film, All Quiet on the Western Front (Lewis Milestone, 1930). She later recounted the experience:

Quite suddenly the theatre was ringing with screams so that at first I thought a fire had started. Panic broke out and girls and women were standing on their seats, shrieking. The film was halted, and it was only when I was out on the street again that I learned from the bystanders that a certain Dr. Goebbels, whose name I had never heard before, had caused ... pandemonium.