Terrorism in the Classroom: Notes on Educating with
Cinema Across Disciplines (The Battle of Algiers)
Herbert E. Gooch III
California Lutheran University
Richard Clark, former director of American counter-terrorism operations under Presidents Bill Clinton and George Bush, briefly summarized an understanding of terrorism by referring to a movie.
When colleagues asked me what to read to understand the problem after September 11, I urged them instead to get an old black and white film, The Battle of Algiers. In it, French counter-terrorism authorities round up all the “known terrorist managers” and leaders (sound familiar?) but lose the war with the terrorists because they did not address the ideological underpinnings. After the known terrorist leaders were arrested, time passed, and new, unknown terrorists emerged. We are likely to face the same situation with al Qaeda. (Clark, 2004: 236)
The Battle of Algiers (1965) depicts one of the most savage revolts of modern times, the Algerian struggle for independence (1954-1962). It focuses on the critical phase of the struggle in which the FLN guerrilla movement turned to urban terrorism in the capitol, Algiers (1956-1957). The French responded by granting the military full sway to impose marital law and suppress by any means available the violence. The FLN was eliminated in Algiers and order restored, but at the cost of stimulating, in the long run, greater resentment against French rule throughout Algeria and a profound moral ambivalence about France’s rule within France itself as evidence of widespread resort to torture surfaced. France eventually granted Algerian Independence in 1962.
This film was made in cooperation with the Algerian revolutionary government in 1965 by the Italian director Gillo Pontecorvo. Filmed on location, only one professional actor was employed. Painstaking effort was taken to show the actual steps the FLN employed to mobilize violent dissent and build their movement from selected assassination to random terror bombing. In equal measure, the measures resorted to in order to crush the dissent and eliminate the FLN movement were recorded, including the widespread and systematic use of torture and conter-terror.
The film was a surprise hit at the Venice Film Festival, and went on to critical acclaim throughout Europe and the United States in 1966 and 1967 winning eleven international cinema awards and three Oscar nominations. It was banned in France for five years. In the 1970s, it became notorious when cited by the Black Panthers and Irish Republican Army as a training film for urban guerrilla war. In the aftermath of 9/11, controversy has been ignited over its relevance for understanding the contemporary “war on terrorism.” In 2004, it was re-mastered and released in DVD format.
I have used this film in Political Science and cross-disciplinary classes at a small liberal arts university for several years. The topics of terrorism and counter-terrorism are inherently fascinating for students in the wake of 9/11 and the continued Western involvement in Iraq. The use of this film in the classroom has particular advantages extending beyond topical relevance.
Despite the foreign, historical, “black and white” character of the film, it never fails to engage students from a generation imbued with digital imagery. For instance, for any classes in Political Science, Sociology, Criminal Justice, or Psychology, it readily stimulates discussion concerning the uses and effects of violence, the role of force and ideology in mobilizing groups, and the ethical and psychological dimensions of resort to violence.
It is especially useful in analyzing the social construction of meaning. On one level, the political, it can be employed to comment on how ideology infuses and diffuses political meaning. Emerging from a specific historical and ideological context, it interprets historical events through a Marxist understanding of decolonization and the strategy of “people’s war.” It can therefore be of special interest to History, Communications, and Philosophy classes as well.
On another level, the artistic, it can be used to illustrate the art of cinematic effect and construction of meaning in a predominantly visual medium. Departing from a “classic Hollywood style” of drama, it employs a false sense of documentary (very interesting in light of the current popularity of documentaries ranging in style from those of Ken Burns to Roger Moore). Most students assume a ready distinction between cinematic forms, between film as accurate reporting (documentary) and film as fictional representation (drama). The Battle of Algiers juxtaposes and fuses the forms in an unconventional, surprising manner and thus undermines our common expectations. By shattering conventions, the film serves to shock students away from staring at towards seeing into the screen.
The subject matter (terrorism) and the approach (use of popular cinema) can “fit” with ease and relevance into any number of courses dealing with the social sciences. A particular advantage emerges when it is used with faculty from different disciplines showing together in the same class or simultaneously as a part of different classes. Not only do the students gain a peculiar insight into how different social sciences disciplines approach understanding and interpretation of significance, but I have also found the interchange of faculty amongst themselves to be most rewarding.
The DVD re-master (Criterion, 2004) includes two additional discs of exceptional interest and quality. The DVD format allows selection of individual scenes, and important consideration for teaching where the film itself stretches beyond the normal class time limits of one or one and a half hour segments. Moreover, it permits using scenes to illustrate, or focus upon specific topics or subject matter according to the agenda of the instructor. Although preferable to show the film uninterrupted, it is no longer necessary given the flexibility DVD formatting provides.
Illustrative Scenes from The Battle of Algiers
Roughly the first half of The Battle of Algiers depicts the tactical and strategic uses of terrorism and urban guerrilla warfare, and the second half the counter-terrorism response. Two scenes, one from each half, illustrate how rich in theme, drama, and interpretation the film as a whole can be. The first depicts women being sent to place bombs in civilian streets; the second spells out the rationale of resort to counter-terror force in the words of the fictional Colonel Mathieu, commandant of the ground operations of the French.
“The Three Women”: Excerpt showing the psychological and physical transformation of three women as they prepare to place terrorist bombs. The music is mesmerizing, a tempo Pontecorvo and the composure, Enrico Morricone, discovered in the casbah of Algiers. The man who passes judgment on the transformation, and gives the women the bombs is Saadi Yacef, who had been the actual terrorist chief of operations for the FLN, and here plays a fictional version of himself. Note the locations of the bombs (an Air France office, a sidewalk café, and a teenagers’ discotheque), all targets composed of innocent civilians at work or play. This scene is very interesting from a number of vantage points, for instance, feminist theory, Roland Barthes’ theory of signs, exploring the nature of terrorism and its effects.
“The Faceless Enemy”: Col. Mathieu (played by the only professional actor in the film) makes abundantly clear that counter-terror success is ultimately not just about the effective application of force, but is contingent on intelligence-gathering (“police work”). This entails climbing the “pyramid” of clandestine cells to find and eliminate the leadership (elsewhere he notes the enemy is like a tapeworm, unless you destroy its head, it reproduces another body within days). He also lays out the rationale for exceeding any civilian restraint and employing torture, i.e., resort to terrorism is beyond the realm of law and civilization and thus warrants an extraordinary resort to methods which themselves extend beyond law and civilization. Mathieu is by no means an unsympathetic character. The compelling logic of his arguments and calm, commanding justification in the name of France are unsettling. Pontecorvo refuses to paint him simply the villain (or the FLN unambiguously the hero). This is an important facet of the film, for it frustrates the typical student impulse to reduce all moral and political issues to a struggle between good and bad. Moreover, it gives the film a sense of balanced regard to taking into account both sides of the struggle, and thereby a sense of the complexity of reality. (The comparisons and contrasts in reacting to the contemporary “war on terror” and the U.S. involvement in the Middle East make for lively and informed discussions).
Setting the Context
The 2004 DVD ancillary materials include documentaries on the making of the film. These will prove of particular interest to Communications and Film classes. The materials describing the setting and actual events of the Algerian war of independence are exceptional in quality. They are composed of documentaries compiled from period news clips, interviews by leading historians and political scholars of the Algerian struggle, and contemporary commentaries by many of the actual participants the struggle of the 1950s.
For those particularly interested in questions of revolution and terrorism, a particularly useful set of documentaries by Films for the Humanities & Sciences(2003) entitled The Age of Terror: A Survey of Modern Terrorism is highly recommended to set the Algerian struggle and the battle for Algiers in historical perspective. Like The Battle of Algiers itself, this set uses film to inform and engage students particularly in the disciplines of Political Science and History.
What follows are some suggested questions and topics suggested by the film divided by Social Science disciplines. References on the film are appended in conclusion. Fortunately there are excellent written sources in English available to students. Of particular interest for students and instructors alike who have limited time to invest in exploring the context of film and history, the following sources will prove rewarding.
On the film itself, Joan Mellen (1973) has a scene by scene analysis of the technical aspects of film-making. The original screen-play and commentaries on it are collected together under the name of co-author PierNico Solinas (1973). Irene Bignardi (2000) has a revealing interview with the director, Pontecorvo.
The best popular history in English by Alistair Horne (1972), but it might well be balanced against the treatment by a leading French historian, Benjamin Stora (2001) and an Algerian commentator, Heggoy (1972). For an introduction to theories of guerrilla warfare, terrorism, and counter-insurgency, see Edgar O’Ballance (1967). The classic statement of the psychological need for violence in making revolution, a view which influenced Pontecorvo greatly, see Frantz Fanon (1968).
Some Themes and Questions by Discipline
Film Studies/Communication
Discuss the influences on cinematic style from Russian “dialectical montage” (Eisenstein) through Italian neo-realism (Rosselini), in contrast to the “classical Hollywood” style (e.g., individual heroes, linear plot, etc.).
Issues of docu-drama: what are the techniques employed in presenting drama in the guise of documentary (newsreel purporting to reflect and recording reality by editing, cinematography, voice-overs, etc.) and the standards of evaluation which should be brought to bear in evaluating the success or failure of such an enterprise?
To what extent is this film merely propaganda or a biased interpretation of events?
What are the didactic elements of the film, e.g., is this a balanced presentation of the two “sides” of the struggle?
Examine the production of the film from the perspective of Pontecorvo’s career and the historical setting of post-war film in an era of “de-colonization.”
Political Science
How adequate and accurate is the analysis/presentation of terrorism and counter-terrorism in terms of strategy and tactics?
Historically, is this an accurate depiction of the Algerian struggle? What is left out? What of the choices of what is included or excluded, how do they shape meaning?
What might be the comparisons and contrasts to the contemporary American “war on terrorism”? What lessons might be derived for the tactical and strategic purposes?
In terms of the history of revolutionary strategy since the French Revolution, where do terrorism and the Algerian experience “fit”?
Psychology
Discuss Fanon’s theory of violence, and its influence on Pontecorvo and the film.
What are the effects of terrorism and counter-terrorism on those who resort to violence, and those who are its victims? Examine both the psychological and sociological implications for societal cohesion and order.
What psychological dimensions of sexual and cultural identity are demonstrated in the transformation of the women bombers?
Sociology
What does this movie tells us of the fundamentals of mass mobilization?
Is there a theory of the state implicit in this film (how can a “state” be ordered to sustain a social existence, and how can it be dis-ordered and an alternative state created—what are the key institutional strategies of order and disorder of political authority)?
How does one explain the absence of a “religious” dimension of revolution in contrast to contemporary forms of terrorism?
Philosophy
What ideological (Marxist) influences shape the structure and interpretation of meaning in construction of the film?
What cinematic techniques are used to “construct” a sense of reality?
Discuss the ethical dimensions of the uses of force to achieve social change, and to defend against the resort to violence to affect change.
Battle of Algiers: References
Alexander, Martin S., Martin Evans, and J. V. Keiger, eds., (2003). The Algerian War and the French Army, 1954-1962:
Experiences, Images, Testimonies. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Alleg, Henri (1958-61). La Question. Paris: Editions des Minuits.
Alleg, Henri (1961). Prisoner of War. Paris: Les Editions de Minuit.
Alleg, Gilberte and Henri et al. (1981). La Guerre d’Algerie. Paris: Messidor.
Aussaressess, Paul ((2002). The Battle of the Casbah: Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism in Algeria, 1955-1957.
Translator Robert L. Miller. New York: Enigma Books.
Barra, Allen (2002, Feb/Mar). “Terror on Film,” American Heritage, NY, 53:1, p. 24.
Bignardi, Irene (2000, March). “The Making of the Battle of Algiers. Cineaste, NY, 25:2, pp. 14-23. from Cineast.
http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?index=22&did=000000052600237&SrchMode=1&sid=2
Bordwell, David, Janet Straiger, and Kristin Thompson (1985). The Classical Hollywood Cinema: Film Style and Mode of
Production to 1960. New York: Columbia University Press.
Clark, Richard A. (2004). Against All Enemies: America’s War on Terror. New York: The Free Press.
Combs, Cindy C. (2003). Terrorism in the Twenty-First Century. 3rd edition. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Crowdus, Gary (2004, Summer). “Terrorism and Torture in the Battle of Algiers: An Interview with Saadi Yacef,” Cineaste, NY,
29:3, pp. 30ff. http://prwuwest.umi.com/pqdweb?index=O&sid=1&srchmode=1&vinst=PROD&fmt=4&st
Dine, Philip (1994). Images of the Algerian War: French Fiction and Film, 1954-1992. London: Oxford University Press).
Evans, Martin (1997). The Memory of Resistance: French Opposition to the Algerian War (1954-1962). New York:
Berg Publishers.
Fanon, Frantz(1968). The Wretched of the Earth. New York: Grove Press.
Feraoun, Mouloud, et al. (2000). Journal 1955-1962: Reflections on the French-Algerian War. Lincoln, NE:
University of Nebraska Press.
Films for the Humanities & Sciences(2003). The Age of Terror: A Survey of Modern Terrorism: “In the Name of Liberation:
Freedom by any Means”; “In the Name of Revolution: Gun-Barrel Politics”; “In the Name of God: Holy Word, Holy War”;
“In the Name of the State: When Might Makes Right.” New York: Films for the Humanities & Sciences. VHS.
four videocassettes.
Gillespie, Joan (1960). Algeria: Rebellion and Revolution. London: Ernest Benn Limited.
Harbi, Mohammed (1999). La Guerre en Algerie. Paris: Editions Complexe.
Harbi, Mohammed and Benjamin Stora (2004). La Guerre d’Algerie: 1954-2004, La Fin de l’Amnesie. Paris: Robert Laffont.
Heggoy, Alf Andrew (1972). Insurgency and Counter-Insurgency in Algeria. Bloomington, Illinois: Illinois University Press.
Henissart, Paul (1971). Wolves in the City: The Death of French Algeria. New York: Hart-Davis.
Hoffman, Bruce (1998). Inside Terrorism. New York: Columbia University Press.
Horne, Alistair (1972). A Savage War of Peace: Algeria 1954-1962. New York: The History Book Club.
Laqueur, Walter and Yonah Alexander (eds.) (1987). The Terrorism Reader. New York: Meridian Press.
Maran, Rita (1989). Torture: The Role of Ideology in the French-Algerian War. New York: Praeger Publishers.
Massu, Jacques (1971). La Vrai Bataille d’Alger. Paris: Librairie Plon.
Mellen, Joan (1973). Filmguide to The Battle of Algiers. Bloomington, Illinois: Indiana University Press.
O’Ballance, Edgar (1967). The Algerian Insurrection, 1954-1962. Hamden, Connecticut: Archon Books.
O’Neill, Bard E. (1990). Insurgency and Terrorism: Inside Modern Revolutionary Warfare. Washington, D.C.: Brassey’s Inc.
Orlando, Valerie K. (2000, Fall). “Historiographic Metafiction in Gillo Pontecorvo’s La Bataille d’Alger: Remembering the
Forgotten War,” Quarterly Review of Film and Video (17:3, pp. 261-271).
Povoledo, Elisabetta (March 17, 2004). “Pontecorvo and the Rebirth of ‘Battle of Algiers’.” The International Herald Tribune,
p. 10.
Pontecorvo, Gillo(1965). Battle of Algiers. Criterion re-release (2004). DVD. 3 disc. Disc One: “The Battle of Algiers”; Disc Two: Pontecorvo and the Film: “Gillo Pontecorvo: The
Dictatorship of Truth” (1992), “Documentary on the Making of The Battle of Algiers,” ‘Five Directors.”; Disc Three: “The Film and
History: Remembering History” (documentary); “Etats d’armes” (2002) documentary; “The Battle of Algiers: A Case Study)
2004; “Gillo Pontecorvo’s Return to Algiers” (1992).
Pontecorvo, Gillo(1969). Burn!. VHS Videocassette.
Pontecorvo, Gillo (1983). “Using the Contradictions of the System,” in Georgakas, Dan and Lenny Rubenstein (eds.),
The Cineaste Interviews on the Art and Politics of the Cinema. Chicago, Illinois: The Lake View Press, pp. 87-97.
Pontecorvo, Gillo (1983). “Political Terrorism in Ogro,” in Georgakas, Dan and Lenny
Rubenstein (eds.), The Cineaste Interviews on the Art and Politics of the Cinema. Chicago, Illinois: The Lake View Press,
pp. 307-312.
Porch, Douglas (2003). The French Secret Services. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux.
Ryan, Michael, and Douglas Kellner (1988). Camera Politica: The Politics and Ideology of Contemporary Hollywood Film. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.
Saadi, Yacef (1962). Souvenirs de la Bataille d’Alger: Decembre 1956-Septembre 1957. Paris: Rene Juilliard.
Said, Edward W. (2000). “The Quest for Gillo Pontecorvo,” in Reflections on Exile and Other Essays. Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, pp. 276-281.
Said, Edward (1992). The Dictatorship of Truth. (VHS). Videocassettes of Channel Four Programs, “The Dictatorship of Truth,”
(NY: The Cinema Guild).
Said, Edward W. (2000, March). “The Dictatorship of Truth: An Interview with Gillo Pontecorvo,” Cineaste, 25: 2pp. 24-25.
Sorel, Georges (1961). Reflections on Violence. Trans. J. Roth and T. E. Hulme. New York: The Free Press.
Solinas, PierNico (ed.) (1973). Gillo Pontecorvo’s The Battle of Algiers, A Film Written by Franco Solinas, English Translation.
New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons.
Springer, Philip B. and Macello Truzzi, eds. (1963). Revolutionaries on Revolution: Participants on the Strategies of Seizing
Power. Pacific Palisades, CA: Goodyear Publishing Company.
Stora, Benjamin (2001). Algeria, 1830-2000: A Short History. Trans. Jane Marie Todd. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Revised Edition.
Sullivan, Thaddeus (1997). “Private View: Images of Liberation,” Sight and Sound, London: British Film Institute, VII:3, p.69.
Taber, Robert (2002). War of the Flea. Washington, D.C.: Brassey’s Inc.
Trinquier, Roger (1980). La Guerre. Paris: A. Michel.
Trinquier, Roger (2006). Modern Warfare: A French View of Counterinsurgency. NY: Praeger.
Turan, Kenneth (2004, January 9). “Movie Review: A Biography of a Movement.” Los Angeles Times.
http://www.calendarlive.com/movies/reviews/cl-et-turan9jan09,2,2570994.story
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