Created in the late 1930s, the film clearly has an anti-war message. The Europeans were pessimistic especially after the war, which caused many sufferings to the whole continent. 'This war democratized suffering' as massive human costs traumatized those who experienced the battlefield and found it difficult to revert back to life after war. (Winter, 2002, Pg. 238). This is exhibited in the film through a few factors, namely the unspoken brotherhood between the soldiers of different nationalities in the camp and the class differences between the characters in the film.
Firstly, we see Renoir drawing a humane imagery of the Germans, who did not mistreat the POWs, but even allow them to receive care packages that are filled with food and alcohol from home. This is vastly different from the imagery of the German to be otherwise in the light of the killings of the Great War. There is another episode in the film where a German guard offers food and a harmonica to Marechal when Marechal was in solitary confinement. The German is portrayed to be like any other human, who can be compassionate and understanding. As another guard comes into the scene and asked the other why Marechal was shouting, he replied that 'the war is taking too long'. The whole camp also engages in a Christmas celebration, where they cheered in joy at the performances together. We see that war actually has brought out the commonality in these soldiers. Both sides that were supposed to be in war were now in common joy over the shared occasion of Christmas. The occasion when a French soldier dons a female dress and wig from the package that Rosenthal receives freezes everyone in their tracks comically illustrated the shared deprivation of the female presence. Through these similarities, Renoir is attempting to establish the irony of war and the basic humanism that exists across all human beings, even though they come from different nations.