The Battle of Algiers (Italy/Algeria: Gillo Pontecorvo, 1966)

The Battle of Algiers (Italy/Algeria: Gillo Pontecorvo, 1966: 121 mins)

Armstrong, Hannah and May Ying Welsh. "Admin Aids French Bombing of Mali After U.S.-Trained Forces Join Rebels in Uranium-Rich Region." Democracy Now (January 15, 2013)

"The Battle of Algiers: 1966 Film Depicting Algerian War of Independence Against French Occupation Parallels Brutal U.S. Occupation of Iraq." Democracy Now (November 9, 2005)

"The Battle of Algiers Turns 50." Current (September 8, 2016)

Benton, Michael Dean. "Introduction and Discussion of The Battle of Algiers." Dialogic Cinephilia (February 20, 2014)

Billet, Alexander. "A Marxist Poet: The Legacy of Gillo Pontecorvo." Monthly Review (October 19, 2006)

Butler, Madison. "The Battle of Algiers (Italy/Algieria: Gillo Pontecorvo, 1966) -– Don't Forget The Timeless Fight for Freedom." Dialogic (ENG 282 International Film Studies student response: May 6, 2009)

Carrasco, Salvador. "The Eternal Return: The Battle of Algiers at 60." Senses of Cinema #118 (July 2026) ["True to content-driven form, The Battle of Algiers has a nonlinear, circular structure that supports the metaphor of the eternal return applicable to colonialism, the resistance to it, and the consequences thereof. The film starts near the end of its chronological Act Three, in 1957 Algiers, the capital of a nation colonised by the French since 1830. The first spoken dialogue is a loaded question – “Couldn’t you have talked sooner?” – asked by a French soldier to an Algerian prisoner whom he and his army buddies have been torturing with a blowtorch, judging from the scorching scar on his chest. The question foreshadows the journey on which we’re about to embark. The Battle of Algiers is as much of a wakeup call as a film can be, as relevant now as when it first came out 60 years ago; as when it reemerged during the so-called War on Terror to help us realise that “terrorists” do not just happen overnight; and as in our present day, when the US and Israel have engaged in yet another unwinnable war, this time with Iran. As soon as it talks to us, The Battle of Algiers forces us to reassess our preconceptions of civilisation, morality, and freedom."]

"Ennio Morricone." [did the soundtrack] Criterion (2012)

Fanon, Frantz. Black Skin, White Masks. trans. Charles Lam Markmann. Pluto Press, 2008.

---. The Wretched of the Earth. trans. Richard Philcox. Grove Press, 2004.



Flood, Maria. "The Battle of Algiers: an iconic film whose message of hope still resonates today." The Conversation (October 18, 2021) 

Flynn, Michael and Fabiola F. Sabek, ed. Screening Torture: Media Representations of State Terror and Political Domination." Columbia University Press, 2012. [Available in BCTC library and your professor has a copy]

Ford, Hamish. "From Otherness 'Over There' to Virtual Presence: Camp de Thiaroye - The Battle of Algiers - Hidden. Postcolonial Cinema Studies. ed. Sandra Ponzanesi & Marguerite Waller. NY: Routledge, 2012: 63-77. [Available in BCTC Library PN1995.9 P6 P68 2012]

Freund, Charles Paul. "The Pentagon's Film Festival: A Primer for The Battle of Algiers." Slate (August 27, 2003)

Gordon, Rebecca. "Torture, Ethically Speaking." Against the Grain (March 30, 2016) ["Is torture ever morally permissible? For what purposes does the U.S. government practice torture? And what should we make of the oft-repeated ticking time bomb scenario? Rebecca Gordon contends that examining torture through the lens of virtue ethics helps us understand what torture does in relation to its targets, its practitioners, and society at large."]

Hudis, Peter. "Frantz Fanon." Against the Grain (March 28, 2016) ["The revolutionary and psychiatrist Franz Fanon was arguably the greatest philosopher of anti-colonialism.  At a time when activists are turning the spotlight on racial oppression, he's never been more relevant. Peter Hudis discusses Fanon's writings on nationalism, race, and humanism. He also explores the controversial question of violence."]

"Jean Martin, 1922–2009." [played Matthieu] Current (February 12, 2009)

Johnson, Sheila K. "The Battle of Algiers and Its Lessons." Common Dreams (September 7, 2003)

Kortright, Chris. "Colonization and Identity." The Anarchist Library (2003)

Koski, Genevieve, et al. "Detroit / Battle of Algiers, Part 1." The Next Picture Show #90 (August 22, 2017) ["Kathryn Bigelow’s intense, controversial new docu-drama DETROIT owes no small debt to Gillo Pontecorvo’s intense, controversial 1966 film THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS, which covers another volatile historical moment with a potent mixture of newsreel-style realism and expressionistic fervor. In this half of our comparison of the two films, we discuss what makes BATTLE OF ALGIERS such an unsettling and resonant film, debate what point it’s making around the issues of terrorism and torture, and, somehow, find the echoes of Pontecorvo’s film in James Cameron’s AVATAR."]

---. "Detroit / The Battle of Algiers, Part 2." The Next Picture Show #91 (August 24, 2017) ["Like Gillo Pontecorvo’s BATTLE OF ALGIERS, Kathryn Bigalow’s new film DETROIT expresses a strong point of view on racial injustice through a careful recreation of a real historical event — and also like BATTLE OF ALGIERS, it’s stirred up some controversy surrounding its docu-journalistic approach. We unpack that controversy, and DETROIT more generally, before diving into how the two films compare in their visceral style, their portrayals of law enforcement, their use of female characters, and more."]

Matthews, Peter. "The Battle of Algiers: Bombs and Boomerangs." Criterion (October 11, 2004)

Memmi, Albert. The Colonizer and the Colonized. Souvenir Press Ltd., 1974.

---.  "The Impossible Life of Frantz Fanon." The Massachusetts Review 14.1 (Winter, 1973): 9-39.

Nicholls, Tracey. "Frantz Fanon." Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (September 21, 2011)

Ortiz, Gaye. "Dark Beauty: Theological Perspectives on War as Cinematic Mythology." Theology and Film: Challenging the Sacred/Secular Divide. ed. Christopher Deacy and Gaye Williams Ortiz. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2008: 160-177.[in BCTC Library]

Potter, Gary. "The Wretched of the Earth." Uprooting Criminology (March 31, 2014)

Prashad, Vijay. "Habits of French Colonialism." ZNet (January 29, 2013)

"Sight & Sound Poll 2012: The Battle of Algiers." Criterion (November 16, 2012)

White, Halaena. "Memmi, Albert." Postcolonial Studies @ Emory (Last updated July 2012)