Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #44311 in DVD
• Released on: 2003-12-01
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Anamorphic, Black & White, PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: Arabic, English, French, Italian
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 116 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Director Gillo Pontecorvo's 1966 movie The Battle of Algiers concerns the violent struggle in the late 1950s for Algerian independence from France, where the film was banned on its release for fear of creating civil disturbances. Certainly, the heady, insurrectionary mood of the film, enhanced by a relentlessly pulsating Ennio Morricone soundtrack, makes for an emotionally high temperature throughout. With the advent of the "war against terror" in recent years, the film's relevance has only intensified.

Shot in a gripping, quasi-documentary style, The Battle of Algiers uses a cast of untrained actors coupled with a stern voiceover. Initially, the film focuses on the conversion of young hoodlum Ali La Pointe (Brahim Haggiag) to FLN (the Algerian Liberation Front.) However, as a sequence of outrages and violent counter-terrorist measures ensue, it becomes clear that, as in Eisenstein's October, it is the Revolution itself that is the true star of the film.

Pontecorvo balances cinematic tension with grimly acute political insight. He also manages an even-handedness in depicting the adversaries. He doesn't flinch from demonstrating the civilian consequences of the FLN's bombings, while Colonel Mathieu, the French office brought in to quell the nationalists, is played by Jean Martin as determined, shrewd and, in his own way, honourable man. However, the closing scenes of the movie--a welter of smoke, teeming street demonstrations and the pealing white noise of ululations--leaves the viewer both intellectually and emotionally convinced of the rightfulness of the liberation struggle. This is surely among a fistful of the finest movies ever made. --David Stubbs

Special Features

• Interview with director Gillo Pontecorvo
  
• Production stills gallery

DVD Technical Information:

• Languages: French, Arabic
  
• Subtitles: English
  
• Running time: 116 mins
  
• Region Code: 2
  
• Widescreen
  
• Aspect Ratio: 16:9 Anamorphic

Synopsis
Gillo Pontecorvo's presents a harrowing, documentary-style depiction of the Algerian's people's struggle to liberate themselves from France between 1954 and 1962. The film creates a stunning illusion of realism by combining actual newsreel footage with staged sequences featuring amateur and professional actors playing characters based on real people (including Saadi Yacef, the one-time leader of the FLN in occupied Algiers). With it's depiction of political torture and violence retaining every bit of the impact they had upon the film's original release, THE BATTLE FOR ALGIERS was re-released theatrically in 2003 to great acclaim and reevaluation. Winner of 11 International Film awards.

Customer Reviews

Still relevant 40 years later.
Put all those irrational prejudices on one side - forget that it's black and white and just read the subtitles (you know you can) - and you'll discover a film that, 40 years on, is just as topical as it was when it was made. Based on real events and shot in a documentary manner the director has sucessfully told a complicated tale of political and racial conflict in an almost totally unbiased way. It is gripping, shocking, poignant and will leave you pondering the rights and wrongs of this and similar situations. I unreservedly recommend this film for anyone who enjoys excellent cinema.

as brutally realistic as it gets
Cited by many people, including the Pentagon as the most realistic war movie ever made, it was with no little expectation that I came to this film. To briefly sum up, it is the late 1950's, and various colonial empires across the globe are in steady decline, including that of France. In Algeria, Muslim nationalist are calling for a state of their own, free from the interference and suppression of the colonial French forces. Unfortunately, French right wingers are at the same time backing the many French settlers who have a vested interest in staying in the country. And so the scene is set for a bloody civil war.
The film initially deals with the conversion of young street hoodlum Ali La Pointe (Brahim Haggiag) to the cause of the FLN, the Algerian Liberation Front. However, from there the film broadens its scope as the FLN take the fight to the French, and the French authorities respond with equal violence. From here on in the film steadfastly refuses to back away from its subject matter, depicting the violence inflicted by both sides with equal disdain, from the effects on the local people of the FLN bombings to the draconian crackdowns instigated by the French in response to this. With the arrival of the French Foreign Legion, led by the charismatic Colonel Mathieu, played with steely hardness by Jean Martin, the battle becomes a cat and mouse game between the leaders of the FLN, and the colonel who believes that only by understanding the enemy can you defeat him (a good lesson, and one that a few people in power today could do to learn).
The film uses a shaky hand held style and coupled with its grainy black and white palate gives it an almost documentary realism (if you caught the film half way through, you could be forgiven for thinking you were in fact watching a documentary). Also, borrowing techniques from the French New Wave and Italian Neo Realism (the use of non-professional actors, using real locations) enhances the realistic feel of the film. Even the dialogue, the way people talk and react to the things going on around them feels neither staged nor awkward. With a few outstanding set pieces, including a nail bitingly tense sequence in which a group of female FLN activist plant bombs around the city, this is one of the most well crafted and well delivered history lessons I have ever seen that forces the viewer to make some very uncomfortable judgments on the subject of colonialism and terrorism. Directed with amazing skill by Italian writer-director Gillo Pontecorvo, it was banned in France for many years for fear that it could spark national unrest, it is a film that remains relevant today as it was when it was first made.

A masterpiece - one of the finest films I've ever seen
This is a film with a rare and timeless pedigree - based on events in Algiers in the mid-1950's, winner of several awards in 1966 when it was released, banned for several years in France, and still relevant to this day, it is a film whose black and white photography gives it immediacy and depth rather than vintage.

The 1950's, and European empires are in decay. The French have lost Indochina ... the USA filling the vacuum in Viet Nam, seemingly oblivious to the defeat the elite of the French army suffered at Dien Bien Phu. In Algeria, there is pressure for the creation of a muslim fundamentalist state and independence from the colonial ruler. The French Right, meanwhile, is backing the many French settlers who have a vested interest in staying. The scene is primed for a civil war of the bloodiest character.

"The Battle of Algiers" opens with a scene of torture ... or shall we say, interrogation. A skeletal Arab has been coerced into giving information. He is dressed in French uniform (black man, white uniform, echoing Fanon) ... ensuring the French don't actually have to kill him themselves ... and paraded around while French troops raid Arab tenement blocks. Within, some of the leaders of the resistance are hiding. And so we drift into flashback mode - how did the protagonists come to be where they are? What is the back story?

You're already fascinated. This is a piece of historical analysis. This is a documentary turned into fiction, and a piece of fiction turned into documentary. The director, Pontecorvo, uses non-professional actors, hand held cameras and diffused lighting to enhance this impression of watching live newsreel footage from the heart of the war zone. The film is about Algiers, but it can symbolise any conflict between a colonial power and the colonised.

The struggle boils down to a battle between the terrorism of the rebels and the terror tactics of the French paratroops. We watch bombs being planted in crowded cafés; it is chillingly real. We watch the cat and mouse games of activists being pursued through the narrow streets of the Kasbah. We watch the impact this has on the bystanders - they are polarised to join one side or the other. One of the leaders of the insurrection comments that terrorism is only a first step - they have to mobilise the people to take action, to strike, to attack the economic base of the colonialists. Already, the resistance is not confined to a few fanatics - men, women and children are actively involved, and their ranks are swelling.

It is superbly paced, beautifully scripted, and astonishingly choreographed - the complexity of the crowd scenes, the rooftop coverage of a living city, the ordinariness of the faces, all combine to create a sense of realism. You feel as if you are there, as if the action is taking place today.

And you wonder why so many invaders have failed to understand what motivates people when they perceive their country as being invaded and their culture as being abused. The French paratroops extol the virtues of the French Resistance fighting the German occupation ... but cannot understand that the Arabs might see themselves as a legitimate resistance movement, not simply 'terrorists'. The paras, themselves, seem to have already forgotten what happened to them at Dien Bien Phu.

"The Battle of Algiers" presents a lesson in history. It also presents a lesson in film-making, for this is cinematography of the very highest quality. A film with no stars, without a glamorous subject, and seemingly dated in its subject matter, yet this is a film which will surprise you by its ability to grip and hold your attention. Beyond a doubt, one of the finest films I have ever seen.