ITALIANS IN ALGIERS

Abstract

Why did Saadi Yacef decide to go to Italy in 1964 to find a director to make a film based on his memoirs of the Battle of Algiers? How far was the resulting film shaped by its Algerian producer and how far by the Italians who worked on it – director Gillo Pontecorvo and screenwriter Franco Solinas, but also cinematographer Marcello Gatti, editor Mario Morra and composer Ennio Morricone? How far did it differ on the one hand from Yacef's original story idea and on the other from the film called Parà that Pontecorvo and Solinas had originally intended to make in Algiers and for which they already had a complete script ready? This article looks at the making of The Battle of Algiers and considers these questions in relation to the film's politics, its narrative construction and its style. It also considers some parallels between the film and the work of Rossellini, in particular Rome Open City.

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