I Accuse

Abel Gance's shattering World War I epic — made while the war was still being fought, with footage shot near actual battlefields using soldiers as extras. Two men, one married to the woman the other loves, are sent to the Western Front, where the horrors they witness forge a bond that transcends their rivalry. The film's climactic sequence is one of the most haunting in all of cinema: the dead soldiers rise from their graves and march home to see whether their sacrifice was worthwhile. Many of the soldiers who appear in this sequence were real servicemen on leave; several were killed in action before the film was released. Gance, who would later push cinematic form to its limits with Napoléon, here channels raw grief and rage into a pacifist statement of overwhelming emotional power. The dead have never looked so accusingly alive.