Perspective Film Series:
The Battle of Algiers (1966)
April 28 | 5:30 PM
1966 | Italy / Algeria | 120 mins
Gillo Pontecorvo’s Battle of Algiers (1966) documents the Algerian revolt against the French in 1954-1962 and the armed insurgency against the French colonial powers in Algiers.
The film follows Colonel Mathieu (Jean Martin), a former French Resistance fighter during World War II, who is sent to Algeria to reinforce efforts to squelch the uprisings of the Algerian War. There, he faces Ali la Pointe (Brahim Haggiag), who, as the leader of the Front de Libération Nationale (National Liberation Front), directs strategies against the colonial French government occupation. As violence escalates on both sides, children shoot soldiers at point-blank range, women plant bombs in cafés, and French soldiers resort to torture to break the will of the insurgents.
The screening will be followed by a moderated conversation and Q&A with Matthew Croombs, Assistant Professor in the Department of Communication, Media, and Film at the University of Calgary.
Disclaimer: This film contains difficult subject matter and imagery, including depictions of violence and torture, which may be triggering for some viewers.
FREE for Members. Non-members: $10—your ticket to this screening includes admission to Contemporary Calgary. Our galleries are open from 12-5 PM for viewing prior to attending the program.
The 2024 edition of Perspective is curated by Muriel N. Kahwagi, Assistant Curator at Contemporary Calgary. The series will feature monthly screenings that amplify voices from the Global South, deconstructing broader moving-image practices through an anti-colonial framework. In particular, this year's Perspective will focus on filmic works from the Caucasus, as well as Southwest Asia and North Africa, a region that continues to grapple with the enduring legacies of colonial violence.
This film is Arabic and French with English subtitles.
About the Moderator:
Matthew Croombs (He/Him)
Matthew Croombs is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Communication, Media, and Film at the University of Calgary. His work focuses on the intersection between documentary film, political modernism, and anti-colonialism, and has been published in Discourse, Cinema Journal, Third Text, The Quarterly Review of Film and Video, and Screen. At the moment, he is completing a manuscript entitled: Cinema Against State Terror: Documentary Aesthetics and the Algerian War.
About the Curator:
Muriel N. Kahwagi (she/her)
Muriel N. Kahwagi is a writer and curator, working primarily across publishing and programming. Her research is centered on the politics of collecting and archiving the performative; and the act of listening as a form of preservation in and of itself. In 2023, she was the TD Curatorial Fellow at Art Windsor-Essex, and a curator as part of Vtape’s Curatorial Incubator, v.19. She is currently the Assistant Curator at Contemporary Calgary, and a programmer at the Toronto Arab Film Festival.
