Musical Motifs in BATTLE OF ALGIERS
The Battle of Algiers • 11m
Observations on Film Art No. 36
Ennio Morricone is perhaps the preeminent film composer of the last half century, an enormously influential artist whose iconic melodies and imaginative orchestrations grace some of the greatest films ever made. In this edition of Observations on Film Art, Professor Jeff Smith analyzes Morricone’s masterful score for Gillo Pontecorvo’s revolutionary bombshell THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS, an explosive portrait of the Algerian struggle for independence from France. Exploring Morricone’s use of two distinct themes—one representing the French fighters, the other the Algerian resistance—Smith illuminates how the latter’s perpetually unresolved harmonics come to mirror the unending nature of the war itself.
Up Next in The Battle of Algiers
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Morricone on Morricone
In this short introduction, the great Ennio Morricone, who scored over five-hundred films during his extraordinary career, discusses the role of the composer, how he came to work with Gillo Pontecorvo on THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS, and the creation of the signature sounds for Pier Paolo Pasolini’s TRI...
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Five Directors on THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS
In this collection of interviews conducted in 2004, directors Spike Lee, Mira Nair, Julian Schnabel, Steven Soderbergh, and Oliver Stone discuss the influence, style, and importance of Gillo Pontecorvo’s film THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS.
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Remembering History
Made just three years after the end of the French-Algerian War (1954–1962), Gillo Pontecorvo’s THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS instantly ignited discussions of this complex historical period. Using the film as a point of reference, this 2004 documentary attempts to reconstruct the Algerian experience of th...
