We Make Our History: The Battle for Algiers vs. Be Kind Rewind

The Battle for Algiers (1966) is a certified classic, honored with multiple awards and classy packaging. Be Kind Rewind (2008), not so much. Yet, seeing these two films within two days of each other leads my brain down some strange alleyways. Join me as I retrace my steps.

First of all, The Battle for Algiers is a foreign film, with all the messiness that implies for an American viewer. It covers the rebellion of Algerian nationals against the French colonialist government that has occupied Algeria for 130 years. The script, both in French and Arabic, is at once realistic and rich in layered meanings. The grainy black and white scenes feel like news footage, all the more so because many of the actors are nonprofessionals – in fact, many lived through the exact events portrayed in the film.

Made only a few years after Algeria gained its independence, the movie is unabashedly pro-Algerian. However, the filmmakers never allow the "enemy" to fall to the level of caricature. The French army is portrayed as intelligent, if ruthless, and not without compassion. The rebels, however, are the more interesting lot.

Mostly, we follow Ali La Pointe, an illiterate petty thief who grows into a top-ranking insurgent as the rebellion against the French grows. Because the movie is based on real events, not all the endings are happy, and even the heroes do some nasty work. The most striking difference from Hollywood cinema is how the filmmakers embrace the awful demands of reality. They don’t gloss over the killing of civilians, or worse, find a way to glorify it, making our hero somehow sexy for being a murderer. Instead, the director willingly draws out scenes (augmented by an eerie score) such as the bombing of a crowded café, allowing the audience plenty of time to consider the bomber’s motivations, the lives of the patrons, and the duplicity of virtually everyone involved. Obviously, the filmmakers tilt our sympathy toward the Algerian cause. But they never lead the audience by the nose, and the French settlers are portrayed as people, not mindless drones. The result is all the more engaging and heart wrenching for the audience.

Be Kind Rewind is not heart wrenching, for all that it shares a few key elements as BfA. Just like Algiers, we follow our homegrown heroes as they struggle to keep Passaic, NJ free from the colonialism of condo developers and snotty New York commuters who don’t give a shit about their soon-to-be bedroom community of Passaic. The utterly insane Jack Black and his considerably more sensible pal Mos Def think they can reclaim their heritage, namely because the building their video store is located in the building that was the birthplace of jazz legend "Fats" Waller. Surely they can convince the world (i.e. Passaic’s residents and city council) that the home of Fats deserves greater than demolition. The way that they choose to finance their crusade (by remaking bootleg versions of all the movies in the store – all having been accidentally erased by a magnetized Black) is a sometimes funny, but ultimately pointless diversion from the heart of the film.

The extended montage of movie remakes (particularly Ghostbusters) is what gets into the all the previews. And certainly, it’s charming to see all the little quirky ways our heroes duplicate flashy special effects on the cheap. Even the progression of the movie making – a 20 minute Field of Dreams is too expensive, so let’s make a five minute version that the requesting customer will actually be in! – hints at the collectivism and community building that our heroes are trying to nurture, in opposition to cold, nasty capitalism. But in the end, even the condo developer doesn’t appear evil – he instead seems to be just another cog, swept up in an economic tide he couldn’t stop if he wanted to. The real evil lies elsewhere, and it’s a good deal more insidious than we expect.

Both of these movies play with the notion that recording history is inseparable from shaping history. In the Battle for Algiers, the filmmakers are totally aware of this, and struggle between a sense of triumphalism and a desire to remain honest observers of a complicated event. This shows up in a thousand little ways: the almost mundane dialogue, the up-and-down sympathy for both sides, the tempering of the final triumph with a string of tragic deaths. In Be Kind Rewind, the characters only seize power by finally making a movie on their own – not a remake of a Hollywood flick on the shelf, but a documentary of Fats Waller himself, during which the lives of Passaic’s characters become utterly entwined with the history they want to record for posterity. To separate the present from the past in their finished Fats film is impossible, because in the end, they have shaped their own history, and they find themselves bound to it.

All movies do this to some extent, because of humans’ inability to separate themselves from what they do in any endeavor. Call it the Heisenberg Uncertainty in the Arts Principle, if you like. But these two did it more consciously than most. One did it better, sure. One resonates more in our "new normal" world. But it’s not unique. We can’t stop molding our past, and whether it’s the Iraq War or a new hotel/condo/restaurant complex in an old neighborhood, someone will keep making these movies.