Director: Gillo Pontecorvo.
Featuring: Brahim Haggiag, Jean Martin, Yacef Saadi, Tommaso Neri.
Italy, 1965. 135 mins. Score by Ennio Morricone.
BIFS continues its theme of War and Resistance with a another classic film dealing with real conflict.
The Battle of Algiers is a superb restaging of the Algerian struggle for independence and the systematic crushing
of this guerrilla movement by the French colonial power between 1954 and 1957. The film moves from the
FLN organisation, an effective guerilla force fighting the French and the crime in the Casbah, to initiatory bombing
campaigns and escalation of violence and reprisal, culminating in the deployment of crack paratroops under the
charismatic resistance hero, Colonel Mathieu. Ennio Morricone’s intense music coupled with fine performances and a
hard-hitting documentary-style devised by Pontecorvo evoke such gripping images of horror and hope to make it one
of the finest political films ever made. Scrupulously even-handed as it is, Ennio Morricone's thunderous score and the
tragic but stirring rhythm of passion and images leaves no doubt about Pontecorvo's political and emotional sympathies.
It is reported that in 2003 the Pentagon screened this film to study: how to win a battle against terrorism and lose the war of ideas!
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