The Battle of Algiers
1966 | War | 120 minutes | In French and Arabic with English subtitles
Info
The film depicts the fight between the rebels (or FLN) in Algeria and the French occupiers from 1954-1962. The most bloody battle is the one for Algiers. The FLN was based in the Casbah section of Algiers. From there the FLN organized their terrorist activities, hoping to weaken French resistance. To retaliate, France sent in paratroopers to destroy the FLN. Both sides were equally brutal resorting to the killing of innocent people, torturing prisoners, and assassinating opposing leaders. As in most such uprisings, the winners were those fighting for their independence. But in each case, the cost was always exceptionally high.
Cast
Why Stream This Film?
- Rotten Tomatoes Score (Critics Consensus): 98%
- Metacritic Score: 95
Accolades
-
Venice International Film Festival: Golden Lion for Best Film
-
Academy Award Nominations: Best Foreign Language Film; Best Screenplay (Gillo Pontecorvo and Franco Solinas); Best Director (Gillo Pontecorvo)
-
Empire Magazine: #6 in the listing of “The 100 Best Films of World Cinema”
Now streaming on:
THE BATTLE of ALGIERS remains even today a triumph of realistic product values. Filming on location in Algiers, using the real locations in the European quarter and the Casbah (which sheltered the FLN), the film achieved convincing actuality. The strength of the film is that it is lucid and dispassionate in its examination of the tactics in both sides.
More extraordinary and therefore more commanding of lasting interest and critical applause is the amazing photographic virtuosity and pictorial conviction of the film. So authentically and naturalistically were its historical reflections staged, with literally thousands of citizens participating in the streets and buildings of Algiers, that it looks almost to be a documentary.
The chafing, mutually incomprehensible collision between Western occupiers and the occupied Muslims has never been captured with such dispassionate, thrilling clarity. THE BATTLE of ALGIERS is a thinking person’s action film in which there are winners—but no heroes.
YOU MIGHT ALSO CONSIDER:
All Quiet on the Western Front
This Oscar-winning film was adapted from Erich Maria Remarque’s novel and many feel it makes a most persuasive anti-war statement. When World War I breaks out in 1914 in Europe, adolescent students in a German school heed…
Ballad of a Soldier
On the Eastern Front during World War II, Private Alyosha Skvortsov single-handedly destroys two attacking German tanks…
Band of Brothers
Adapted from Stephen Anbrose’s bestseller, the series follows the men of Easy Company, 101st Airborne Division, from their training in Georgia during the spring of 1942, to the D-Day invasion, the horrendous Battle of the Bulge, the liberation of the concentration camps, and the final victory in 1945…
Contact
If you found this site helpful, please recommend it to a friend. We also welcome your comments.
info@streaming-flix.com / call 917-439-3364
P.O. Box 20038
New York, N.Y. 10075
0 Comments