The Casbah, the city of Algiers’ infamous labyrinthine slum district, is central to any understanding of the Algerian colonial situation and the country’s subsequent resistance movement. More than simply a geographical region, the Casbah is a symbol of alienation, of repression, of captivity, and of racial, social, and economic inequality. This district has been portrayed differently in both factual and fictional instances numerous times throughout history. The two most respected visual representations to date are Julien Duviver’s romanticized Pépé le Moko (1937) and Gillo Pontecorvo’s naturalistic The Battle of Algiers (1966). In this essay, we will attempt to demonstrate how each of these films operate under fundamentally opposing motivations due to their filmmaker’s backgrounds. By examining these motivations, we can come to a better understanding of what brought about the hostile, violent conditions surrounding the independence movement.
Pépé le Moko’s interpretation is highly suggestive of the myth surrounding the colonial holdings. It finds inspiration in popular culture and colonial attitudes of colonial France. As these tourism posters found below demonstrate, representations of colonial North Africa often held the area as a place of mystery and adventure, a place where someone could experience the exotic, the rare and the wild. The myth is sweetened still by assuring the French travelers that they are in good hands. The metropol is in charge here, and household names such as Air France have vetted the locations and found them suitable for the French to enjoy. Best of all, within mere kilometers of Marseille, they are an exotic adventure close to home. Frantz Fanon describes this attitude, stating, “. . . the Western bourgeoisies, who come to [the colony] as tourists avid for the exotic, for big game hunting, and for casinos. The [Algerians organize] centers of rest and relaxation and pleasure resorts to meet the wishes of the Western bourgeoisie” (153).
To further examine these ideas, the following excerpt from Aimé Césaire’s Discourse on Colonialism, quotes “colonial psychoanalyst” Octave Mannoni, writing about what he called the native Madagascan’s “dependency complex.” He tells us:
It is the destiny of the Occidental to face the obligation laid down by the commandment Thou shalt leave thy father and thy mother. This obligation is incomprehensible to the Madagascan. At a given time in his development, every European discovers in himself the desire . . . to break the bonds of dependency, to become the equal of his father. The Madagascan, never! He does not experience rivalry with the paternal authority, "manly protest," or Adlerian inferiority-ordeals through which the European must pass and which are like civilized forms . . . of the initiation rites by which one achieves manhood . . . (Césaire 14-15).As Césaire so bluntly puts it, “The-Negroes-are-big-children,” and France is the mother that is obligated to support her offspring. As we’ll see, Pépé le Moko offers through its visual technique a disturbing reinforcement of Mannoni’s assertions. Take a look at these two clips from Pépé le Moko:
Here, it is important to note that Pépé le Moko is what some film historians would call a proto-noir. It is also a landmark of the fatalistic “poetic realism” style prominent in 1930’s French cinema. As a precursor to the film noir movement of 1940’s Hollywood, the film borrows from influential Weimar Expressionist cinema to create a style favoring high contrast lighting and distinctive art direction, enhancing the supposed “realistic” approach.
Throughout the film, French émigré/gangster Pépé displays a profound connection with his environment. He is able to deftly navigate the treacherous corridors of the Casbah, evading police and authority figures with unnatural ease. Critic Janice Morgan suggests that, “the hero himself has become inextricably linked to the colonial culture--in fact, he is dependent on it” (645). It may be that Morgan has it backwards; that it is in fact the Casbah that is dependent on Pépé. For example, after his young friend Pierrot is killed by the police, Pépé gets drunk and becomes wildly confrontational. Accordingly, just outside the café, the Casbah itself erupts in a fight when a business dispute turns ugly. Despite his intoxication, Pépé’s “fatherly instincts” kick in and he takes it upon himself to violently break up the fight. Moments later, Pépé decides that he does have the freedom to leave the Casbah, and attempts to do just that. He doesn’t get very far, as his chaotic mind state and, indeed, the chaotic Casbah, impede his progress. In this brief chase sequence, Pépé is chased by his gypsy lover Inés, who only just manages to catch him before he delivers himself to the cops waiting below. Duvivier’s framing has each character stuff the cluttered screen, elegantly conveying the Casbah’s claustrophobic atmosphere. It would seem the entire Casbah doesn’t want our Gallic hero to abandon it, and will do anything--push, present obstacles, and even lie--in order to prevent Pépé from leaving.
The second sequence provides a contrasting example of the same expressionistic technique being used in the film. Unlike the intricately shadowed, manic-depressive depths of the Casbah, the morning brings a rejuvenating brightness to the film. After spending a night in Paris, or rather, a night with a woman from Paris, Pépé is elated enough to serenade the Casbah. As if in submission, we watch as the entire Casbah--the cobbler, the Arab inspector , the children, Pépé’s accomplices, and especially the women--stares up in admiration, overjoyed at this western man’s good fortune. As we see in the clip above,and as Ms. Morgan accurately points out, the Arab Inspector Slimane is frequently and unfavorably photographed at a low oblique angle to Pépé, expressing his implicit subordination). (641)
Of course, it wouldn’t be inaccurate to describe Pépé le Moko as a very “Hollywood” style production, so some degree of romanticization is expected for entertainment’s sake. Each of these sequences, however, offers a distressing insight into how exactly contemporary French popular opinion was reflected in their entertainment. The fact that (1) the film operates such that the mood of the Casbah is reliant on and can be reduced to the mood of a single white protagonist, and (2) that the the film was received enthusiastically and uncritically (at least concerning its representation of colonial power structures) by both critics and audiences, speak to the cultural indifference and/or sense of superiority of the French towards their colonial “subjects” in 1937; evidence of Mannonian psychoanalysis in practice.
In stark contrast, The Battle of Algiers, while concerned with much of the same subject matter as Pépé le Moko (i.e. the colonist/colonized relationship), is far less informed by romance and colonial psychology than it is by historicity and actual events. For the Italian filmmakers, Algiers and the Casbah, “offered the perfect material for their investigation of the confrontation between nationalist feeling and colonialism” (Parker 62).
Along with Césaire’s Discourse on Colonialism, Frantz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth is arguably the most influential text for the Italian leftists who spawned The Battle of Algiers. Fanon’s own experience in Algeria as a psychiatrist for the French government led him to empathize with the Algerian people, and he uses this experience to theorize about the roots and methods of decolonization movements. Fanon speaks of the “native intellectual,” who, while instrumental in the conception of the Liberation movement, is held back by the individualistic trappings of his Western education:
The colonialist bourgeoisie, in its narcissistic dialogue, expounded by the members of its universities, had in fact deeply implanted in the minds of the colonized intellectual that the essential qualities remain eternal in spite of all the blunders men may make: the essential qualities of the West, of course. The native intellectual accepted the cogency of these ideas, and deep down in his brain you could always find a vigilant sentinel ready to defend the Greco-Latin pedestal. Now it so happens that during the struggle for liberation, at the moment that the native intellectual comes into touch again with his people, this artificial sentinel is turned into dust. All the Mediterranean values—the triumph of the human individual, of clarity, and of beauty—become lifeless, colorless nickknacks. (46-47)Fanon’s notion of shedding bourgeois values and traditions runs throughout the text, and is even conspicuously present in the narrative structure and visual technique of the film itself. Unlike Pépé le Moko’s meticulously controlled lighting and framing, which by the 1960’s had become a standard in “professional” filmmaking, The Battle of Algiers is consciously amateurish at times with its use of natural lighting and handheld shakycam. The film pulls no political punches, opening in the immediate aftermath of a literally torturous French interrogation in which an Algerian resistance fighter has revealed the location of one of the movement’s leaders, Ali LaPointe. Through a series of flashbacks, we are led to believe, at least at first, that Ali is the “main character” or protagonist of the film. However, the film itself is as interested in rejecting traditions as Fanon was, and therefore the classical-style narrative soon expands into a grandiose montage of much greater breadth and far less individual focus than these early scenes. Due to the trappings of storytelling itself, the movie maintains only the barest bones of characters and dramatic plotting, instead focusing primarily on events: assassinations, bombings, and the opposing sides’ reactions to these events, blow by blow.
We have pointed out many times in the preceding pages that in underdeveloped regions the political leader is forever calling on his people to fight: to fight against colonialism, to fight against poverty and underdevelopment, and to fight against sterile traditions. (95)
There is a multitude of similar examples in the film of these episodic vignettes that may do little to advance the plot, but are rather more effective in delivering the message. Time and again we witness the nameless, but not faceless, masses demonstrate their defiance through random acts of violence. And, lest we forget, we see reciprocation in kind from the French. Initially, the Algerians focus on colonial police as their targets, but, as certainly they learned from the best, the violence eventually reaches out to civilians and the French colonial community as a whole. Near the deadly climax of the film the Algerian nationalists are machine gunning French civilians outside the cosmopolitan shops in the French Quarter.
Ali LaPointe, Jafar, and Ben M’Hidi may have been the faces of the National Liberation Front (FLN), but the organization is merely the ignition mechanism of the resistance. In fact, the film makes it a point not overestimate the necessity of the FLN by tying together its fractured narrative strands only to document the elimination of the movement’s leaders. Furthermore, by wasting no time in juxtaposing the demise of Ali with depictions of the masses protesting nonviolently in the streets, the film suggests that Ali and the FLN’s violent ways had run their course. In the face of severe police brutality, the masses peaceably march on the French Quarter, as they will be contained by the Casbah no longer. Fanon has this to say of the relationship between the nationalist party and the masses:
This consideration of violence has led us to take account of the frequent existence of a time lag, or a difference of rhythm, between the leaders of a nationalist party and the mass of the people. In every political or trade-union organization there is a traditional gap between the rank-and-file, who demand the total and immediate bettering of their lot, and the leaders, who, since they are aware of the difficulties which may be made by the employers, seek to limit and restrain the workers' demands. (107)Just as Ali’s brash, blundered transformation from petty criminal to revolutionary would inspire others to join the movement, so did the revolution itself require an ideological party as impetus. However, the film asserts that in the fight against colonialism, the “violence” that Fanon deems so necessary or inevitable in any decolonization process is not sustainable. The nonviolent protests are what end the film, suggesting that it takes the rejection of violence by the masses, and perhaps an essential revision of the nationalist party, in order to fully progress.
As we have seen, this is a story of the masses for the masses, made for the downtrodden proletariat oppressed by Europe’s imperialist powers. Using Fanon’s quasi-biographical account, the film opts for a “documentary” style that attempts to portray the events of the film realistically and offers at least the guise of objectivity. The myths manifested in print by the tourism posters of yesteryear and encouraged by the glamorous Hollywood-esque sound stages of Pépé le Moko have no place here. Importantly, The Battle of Algiers often feels more like a news reel than a film. These efforts to represent Algiers and the Casbah as it was, rather than as a Mannonian myth, lead to what could be considered a surprising authenticity.
Below we see images from the archives of L'Établissement de communication et de production audiovisuelle de la Défense, or ECPAD, the communication and audiovisual arm of the Ministry of Defence in France. ECPAD is charged with documenting France’s war and defense efforts, so it is these images that should stand as a direct counterweight to any sensationalism or polarization on the part of the producers of The Battle of Algiers. Yet these images, as seen below, would for the most part not be out of place scattered within the a cut of the film itself. In fact, each represented below could be easily mistaken to be shots from the film itself.
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| Figure 6 - ECPAD.fr Photograph |
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| Figure 7 - The Battle of Algiers |
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| Figure 8 - ECPAD.fr Photograph |
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| Figure 9 - The Battle of Algiers |
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| Figure 10 - ECPAD.fr Photograph |
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| Figure 11 - The Battle of Algiers |
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| Figure 12 - ECPAD.fr Photograph |
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| Figure 13 - The Battle of Algiers |
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| Figure 14 - The Battle of Algiers |
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| Figure 15 - ECPAD.fr Photograph |
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| Figure 16 - The Battle of Algiers |
Works Cited
Fanon, Frantz. The Wretched of the Earth. Trans. Constance Farrington. New York: Grove Press, 1963. Print.
Morgan, Janice. “In the Labyrinth: Masculine Subjectivity, Expatriation, and Colonialism.” French Review 67.4 (1994): 637-647. Print.
Parker, Mark. “The Battle of Algiers (La battaglia di Algeri).” Film Quarterly 60.4 (2007): 62-66. Print.
Pépé le Moko. Dir. Julien Duvivier. Perf. Jean Gabin, Mireille Balin, Paul Escoffier, and Line Noro. Criterion, 1937. DVD.
The Battle of Algiers. Dir. Gillo Pontecorvo. Perf. Brahmin Hadjadj, Jean Martin, and Yacef Saadi. Criterion, 1966. DVD.
