ory was achieved. At that time, the Democratic and Popular Republic of Algeria was constitutionally mandated a single-party state, with the FLN being that party (Nelson xxii).
The Battle of Algiers is a documentary-like retelling of the story of the revolution that began in 1954, and director Pontecorvo uses amateur performers to recreate the battles and other incidents of the rebellion. The violence of the confrontation is heightened in some ways by the use of amateurs and by the gritty photography, giving the film the aura of a documentary, as if the filmmakers were present at the actual events instead of recreating them. The actors play armed guerrilla bands and French soldiers. People are seen engaged in mass rioting. The intent of the indigenous population is to cast out the French who have been ruling the land as a colonial power for some time, and in a sense, the French are only the last straw for the people after centuries of foreign domination.
The film evokes a tradition in Italian film, a tradition whereby filmmakers manage to create works with a documentary-like vision of real events so as to mix reality and art in a direct way. At the time, Italian neorealism developed under onerous circumstances and became a form by which Italian filmmakers could express themselves in a new way. Essentially, the early neorealist filmmakers were doing what they could with the tools at hand and doing it under the watchful eyes of an antagonistic ruling class, and from the tensions this arrangement produced they created something distinctive, allowing them to develop ideas and to do so in a new cinematic style. At the time, Italy was ruled by the Fascists, who viewed art as valuable only to the degree it was useful. Yet, these films were not made in service of fascist ideas but as a counter to them. The forces that helped shape these films, the style that was produced by these tensions, and some important examples demonstrat...