Steven Brence
10-15-2009, 11:34 AM
1. Why does Ali La Pointe prefer to risk arrest in order to punch the French man who trips him as he runs from the police? What does this indicate about the motivations for his transformation into a leader of the rebellion against the French, and perhaps about the motivations for the rebellion itself?
2. What work is the film attempting to accomplish through the scene in which the prisoner is sent to the guillotine in the prison square? Recall that we only hear the sound of the blade falling while being shown the prison walls overlooking the square.
3. The bombings in the film are first undertaken by the French in retaliation for the shooting of Colonial police officers, targeting the house (in the densely populated Casbah) of one of the shooters. The FLN responds with bombings in crowded places like the airport, an after-work bar, and a teenage dance club, supposing that direct retaliation would only get the population slaughtered by the French Army. Are any of these bombings, by the French or the Algerians, justified?
4. Is a soldier’s only duty to win, as is suggested by Colonel Mathieu? That is, is morality, what Mathieu called “humane considerations”, irrelevant in violent conflict?
5. Similarly, if the French population remains committed to continuing their presence in Algeria as an end, do they then forfeit the right to question the means that would achieve that end, irrespective of the morality of those means?
6. Why does Mr. Ben M’Hidi (the FLN leader that wore glasses, before he is arrested and killed by the French army) suggest to Ali La Pointe that, as hard as it is to win a revolution, it is only after victory that “the real difficulties begin”? What does he mean? How would this apply to the French as well as to the Algerians?
7. What is it that the Algerian people want when asked by the French army commander through the bullhorn at the end? Why was this still a question for the French, after years of deadly struggle? Isn’t it the same thing they want for themselves, or have they perhaps come to take that for granted, their own revolution being more than 160 years old by this point?
8. Have we as Americans perhaps come to take for granted what presumably motivated our own revolution, now more than 230 years ago, when we send our soldiers around the world? Should we still question why they are not always greeted with flowers and parades when we do, despite our sometimes benevolent intentions?
9. Why was Ali La Pointe opposed to the strike because, as he said, “we were ordered not to use arms”? Was he, at that point of the struggle, just convinced as to the necessity of violence as a means, or does his position suggest an equality of importance in the manner of attaining liberty with the liberty itself?
10. What does the loud drumming sound heard frequently throughout the film (while the three women prepare to pass as French or at least Bourgeois, for example) signify or represent? Why is it heard as the film ends, over the credits?
2. What work is the film attempting to accomplish through the scene in which the prisoner is sent to the guillotine in the prison square? Recall that we only hear the sound of the blade falling while being shown the prison walls overlooking the square.
3. The bombings in the film are first undertaken by the French in retaliation for the shooting of Colonial police officers, targeting the house (in the densely populated Casbah) of one of the shooters. The FLN responds with bombings in crowded places like the airport, an after-work bar, and a teenage dance club, supposing that direct retaliation would only get the population slaughtered by the French Army. Are any of these bombings, by the French or the Algerians, justified?
4. Is a soldier’s only duty to win, as is suggested by Colonel Mathieu? That is, is morality, what Mathieu called “humane considerations”, irrelevant in violent conflict?
5. Similarly, if the French population remains committed to continuing their presence in Algeria as an end, do they then forfeit the right to question the means that would achieve that end, irrespective of the morality of those means?
6. Why does Mr. Ben M’Hidi (the FLN leader that wore glasses, before he is arrested and killed by the French army) suggest to Ali La Pointe that, as hard as it is to win a revolution, it is only after victory that “the real difficulties begin”? What does he mean? How would this apply to the French as well as to the Algerians?
7. What is it that the Algerian people want when asked by the French army commander through the bullhorn at the end? Why was this still a question for the French, after years of deadly struggle? Isn’t it the same thing they want for themselves, or have they perhaps come to take that for granted, their own revolution being more than 160 years old by this point?
8. Have we as Americans perhaps come to take for granted what presumably motivated our own revolution, now more than 230 years ago, when we send our soldiers around the world? Should we still question why they are not always greeted with flowers and parades when we do, despite our sometimes benevolent intentions?
9. Why was Ali La Pointe opposed to the strike because, as he said, “we were ordered not to use arms”? Was he, at that point of the struggle, just convinced as to the necessity of violence as a means, or does his position suggest an equality of importance in the manner of attaining liberty with the liberty itself?
10. What does the loud drumming sound heard frequently throughout the film (while the three women prepare to pass as French or at least Bourgeois, for example) signify or represent? Why is it heard as the film ends, over the credits?