Days of Glory and Battle of Algiers

Although there were a few exceptions of sympathetic French toward colonial subjects shown in both films, the fact is they both intentionally try to show how "native" French do not see them as equally human.  This is supported by, for example, the tomato incident in Days of Glory and in the decision to implement systematic torture as a strategy in The Battle of Algiers.  Say what you will about the complexities of the particular eras (WWII with the inhabitants of the colonies beginning to demand more autonomy and the Algerian War with France struggling to hold on to its position as a major world power), the fact is France had institutional racism.  This history is hard to face for most French today. Days of Glory is directly intended to correct this larger wrong through the case of soldiers in WWII because it is hard for the public to disagree.

Un Long Dimanche de Fiancailles

The headstrong Mathilde is what makes this film such an effective juxtaposition of the atrocities of WWI and the emotional aftermath of loss experienced by survivors. Against all logical odds she holds on to her intuition and metaphysical connection to her fiance, Manech as she unravels the mystery of Bingo Crepuscule. I think at the heart of the odds against her is a negotiation for legitimate knowledge (epistimology) between the dominant male ways of knowing truth (reason) and women's ways of knowing (a different kind of reason that spans the gap between the head and the heart, or emotions/feelings and logical reasoning.  The latter ends up the most successful for trying to come to terms with the utter senselessness of that horrific war.

Black and White in Color

This films gives voice to a re-articulation of the critique of French colonialism at a time when there was fairly wide-scale disillusionment with some of the failed aspects of the Fifth Republic; namely, the failure of integration of diverse ethnic groups from former colonies and the break in economic progress after the Trente Glorieuses.


The most interesting figure in this is arguably Hubert, the young geographer.  He still marches forward in the spirit of post-enlightenment humanistic positivism yet he breaks the code in how "the natives" are viewed. There is more into it than that, I think.  Is he, perhaps, a projection of the director who clearly has sympathies for the Cameroonians?   Is he a model of a new Frenchman (more enlightened in a modern context of post-colonial globalization)?  Or, is he only a supporting character for someone else who is more crucial to the main point of the filmaker?