Introduction
Among all of the French war films to come out in the aftermath of the 2005 riots, none has arguably had a stronger political and social impact, nor reached more people, than Rachid Bouchareb’s Indigenès. In its online “Indigènes” statistical metrics page, JP’s Box-Office reports that the movie reached over three million viewers and grossing over twenty million Euros in France after premiering in the summer of 2006. But arguably the most important person it impacted was President Jacques Chirac, who upon seeing it changed the policy of compensation for Algerian veterans of the French Army. The Policy had been all but suspended after the Algerian war of independence (Jaafar 9). This film takes us further back in history, to the use of African conscripts and recruits during the liberation efforts of WWII. The film explores the relation of the four main characters to the spaces of continental France as opposed to colonial France, as did La trahison. In that movie, the spatial study focuses on the definition of Algerian spaces and their boundaries. It shows how the French saw those spaces as non-Places, but it also helps the present French viewer to discover the formation of a new identity for the Harkis. In Indigènes, the focus shifts from how the French viewed Algeria to the view of France from the eyes of North Africans. The spatial study of this chapter will analyze this view, while the second half of the study will explore the relationships between French and North African military
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personnel. Before beginning the analysis of spaces and relationships, we will briefly review the writings of Franz Fanon. Fanon was a francophone writer involved in the war of Algerian independence and was uniquely positioned to educate the world on the details of the unique Franco-Algerian relationship.
Fanon was one of many Francophone intellectuals who became involved in the Franco- Algerian conflict, undoubtedly more than most. Of Antillean origin, his medical training in psychiatry took him to Algeria, where he assisted and treated war victims (including military).
He wrote about his experience in the war, and an unequivocal repudiation of colonialism marks his writings. His condemnation of the system and of the European societies, which took
advantage of their colonies, was sharp and compelling. Jean-Paul Sartre volunteered to write a preface for the publication of one of his most renowned works, Les damnés de la terre12. The very first paragraph begins with:
Il n’y a pas si longtemps, la terre comptait deux milliards d’habitants, soit cinq cent millions d’hommes et un milliard cinq cent millions d’indigènes. Les premiers disposaient du Verbe, les autres l’empruntaient. Entre ceux-là et ceux-ci, des roitelets vendus, des féodaux, une fausse bourgeoisie forge de toute pièce servaient
d’intermédiaires13. (Fanon 9)
From the outset, Sartre explains the colonial phenomenon as a separation of two worlds, the European, and the Native or Indigenous world that he calls indigène. This term is typically used in Francophonie to designate people within the French empire who are not ‘Français de souche’,
12 The title given in English is “The wretched of the earth” although one could argue that ‘The damned of the earth’
could be a closer and more appropriate translation.
13 “Not so long ago, the earth counted two billion inhabitants, about five hundred million men and one billion five- hundred million natives. The first had at their disposal the Verb, the others borrowed it. Between these ones and those ones, sold wrens, feudals, a false bourgeoisie forged from scratch served as intermediaries” (my translation).
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in other words, individuals who are not French of European ancestry. Sartre extends this definition to include the rest of the world who is not Europe or the West, the part that is not an active colonial metropolis. With this extension, Sartre inadvertently catalogs Europe as a cultural Place and the rest of the World as a Non-Place. He is not advocating this point of view but rather recognizing its existence from a French point of view.
Sartre supports the anti-colonial agenda within the Metropolis and to stamp his approval on Fanon’s work. His understanding of colonialism reveals that even among the intellectual intelligentsia, this separation of worlds was understood. The principle of universalisme never operated effectively in France. He also points out that what occurred for those who made some
‘progress’, (for natives who learned well the culture and the language of the oppressor), a special class was created. This class was a social no man's land that transformed them into Europeanized exploiters of their own kind.
As seen in La trahison, the four Harkis were part of this group, albeit at the bottom of the pecking order. In the introduction to Fanon’s work, Sartre is rather referring to local (indigène) public officials and private administrators of businesses with whom the French dealt. These locals served first, to exploit the physical and human resources of the colonies, and second, as a buffer between the metropolitans and the colonized, in spite of being in many cases officially recognized as French. Colonization was much more than the exploitation of others. It was in many ways the effective creation of this Other, inferior to the metropolitan, to justify this exploitation. As long as this Other identified as an indigène exists, universalisme cannot work.
The problematic is best understood by making an important difference in the way that indigènes were regarded vis-à-vis the republic. They were French nationals, but not French citizens (Spire 48). This differentiation of status prevented them from having the same rights and privileges as a
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French citizen of European descent. This differentiation of status had already affected other minorities at its inception. For example, a difference existed between men and women. The former received citoyenneté (citizenship) at birth, with the latter only inheriting nationalité (nationality) while being deprived of rights such as suffrage (Spire 47). In the social stratification of the French Empire, Algerians were already a step above other colonial subjects. They were considered citizens, above other colonial subjects such as Moroccans, Sub-Saharan Africans or Indochinese because Algeria was considered a French department rather than a territory. Still, they were legally referred to as Muslim French until the end of the war:
Dans le cadre d’un projet de sociohistoire de la citoyenneté visant à étudier les conditions d’accès aux droits généralement dévolus à la qualité de Français, le cas algérien apparaît exemplaire : tandis que la frontière entre Français « citoyens » et Français « sujets » a perduré pendant plus d’un siècle, l’ordonnance adoptée le 7 mars 1944 instaure un principe d’égalité des droits et des devoirs entre Français musulmans et non musulmans14. (Spire 49)
When the World Wars broke out during the first half of the 20th century, the European empires called upon their colonial subjects to support the war effort. This aid came in various forms, from factory workers to conscripted and voluntary soldiers to bolster the armies. Indigènes is set in this context to revise the largely and deliberately obscured and overlooked contribution of these minorities. This chapter analyzes how the film aims to rectify the omission of their contributions from the history of France.
14 Within the framework of a sociohistorical project on citizenship aiming to study the conditions of access to rights generally bestowed upon the French, the Algerian case appears exemplary: given that the boundary between French ‘citizens’ and french ‘subjects’ has endured for over a century, the ruling adopted on March 7th, 1944 establishes a principle of equality of rights and duties between Muslim and non-Muslim French (Translation by me).
81 Film Synopsis
Indigènes is a 2006 French-Algerian war film that follows the story of –as in La trahison– four North African soldiers who enlist in the French army during the Second World War. Their primary mission is to assist with the deliverance of the French fatherland from the Nazi invasion. The use of four protagonists, as in La trahinson, allows the viewer to explore more than one point of view based on the experience of the Natives. The viewer can see the reasons different Natives had for joining the war effort different types of relations to the French and with their own land and people. The men’s military service derives from different
motivations for participation. Abdelkader is the idealist who unconditionally loves France and aspires to become a citizen equal to the Europeans. Yassir and his brother Messaoud are simply looking for a job and steady paycheck, as are some of the secondary but affable characters. And finally, Saïd, who is likable but naïve and initially servile. The story follows these men and others who fight alongside them. It starts with their recruitment and training in North Africa, passing by their first battles in Italy and the French Midi, up to the last fights in northern France.
In the final campaign, all but Abdelkader will lose their lives.
These colonial fighters sacrificed most during the efforts of Free France -the exiled French government of WWII- led by De Gaulle from England. Martin Thomas explains:
The estimated 16,500 Free French military losses during campaigning in North Africa and Italy were primarily colonial. Villages in Morocco, Mali, and Algeria, not Brittany, the Ardèche, or the Pas-de-Calais, mourned the largest numbers of soldiers killed in French uniform after June 1940. (Thomas 49)
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The final scene of the picture shows the solitary survivor five decades later, living in France in poverty and crying during a visit to the military cemetery tombs of his comrades. He questions whether his fight was worth the sacrifice since the veteran survivors of minority origin received neither credit nor fair treatment for their vital contributions to the rescue of the Republic.
The title of this 2006 motion-picture is charged with meaning. The film emphatically established the significance of the contributions of the indigènes to the survival of France, as French people themselves. It also reveals the inefficacy of the pretention that they were
considered fully French. The film shows that France may be a country made up of a diversity of cultures, but that many within the Metropolis still consider the minority components of this culture as foreigners. The majority will continue to label as immigrants regardless of how much of traditional French culture these outsiders adopt, or what sacrifices they give to be accepted.
The film illustrates the impact that these African servicemen had in the liberation of France while finding themselves part of a country that claimed them as subjects while rejecting their citizenship rights. The liminality of the non-Places in which the war places them allows these men to define their identity better. They are more than not French enough; they become French of Algerian origin.
Rachid Bouchareb spoke repeatedly, in relation to his films, on how, as a storyteller, he intends to illustrate the journey of meeting of different peoples. Indigènes premiered and garnered much attention during the 2006 Cannes Film Festival. In an interview during the festival, the director mentioned that he wanted to “really show the encounter between the French people, the North-Africans, the Africans and to show all the partners that had in common this history. With scenes of war, fully heroic characters, so it was a very wish to be both epic and very popular but in a good sense” (Barlet). In other words, Bouchareb wanted to transmit the
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feelings and emotions of those who lived the stories through vivid storytelling. This is one of the reasons why he chose to film Indigènes in the epic styles of movies such as Saving private Ryan and other popular WWII movies shot in a grand scale. To achieve this, he spent time during the years of pre-production interviewing veterans (Plateau Extérieur Invité: Rachid Bouchareb) and putting together a team who, through families and acquaintances, had first-hand and secondary knowledge of the participation of colonial troops in French Wars.
During the premiere of the film in Cannes, he invited veterans to the screening. Some of them accompanied the stars in the subsequent public appearances to discuss the film. Bouchareb also arranged for a screening for President Chirac accompanied by Jamel Debbouze and other cast members, who co-starred and co-produced. Debbouze recounts how productive was discussing the film, not only with the President and his wife, but with other ministers and high- ranking politicians as well (Interview with Director of Outside the Law & Days of Glory: Rachid Bouchareb 3:33-4:10). Debbouze stated that he was impressed by the response of that select audience, and how receptive they were to the plight of the colonial veterans (Jamel Debbouze
"Indigènes a changé des choses"). In latter interviews, he manifested his satisfaction with the policy change that the film had caused regarding the restoration of pensions for colonial veterans (Interview Rachid Bouchareb). Both Debbouze and Bouchareb, along with the other
protagonists, spoke about the film as an illustration of a forgotten past, and as a part of a conversation on acceptance and identity. This conversation is especially relevant for the descendants of the colonial soldiers who sacrificed for France, but whose sacrifice remains forgotten.
To achieve such goals through the film, most of the camera work consists of medium shots and close-ups of not only the protagonists, but of a large and diverse supporting cast. This
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diversity illustrates their plights in detailed, intimate fashion. Lots of attention is paid to the expressivity of each character, illustrating the different motivations every one of them had for joining the fight to liberate France. Jim Emerson, reviewing the film for Roger Ebert’s website, notes that the camera follows the men up-close even during most of the fight-scenes. He notes how they are surrounded by explosions but are covered in dirt rather than fire or blood. This remark may be a suggestion of the future interment of the majority of the men, who, later in the narrative, will eventually pay the ultimate sacrifice for the liberation of France. There are rare exceptions to this shooting approach, as Jim Emerson notes something interesting about the camera work during the first battle scene. Says Emerson:
Bouchareb cuts from ground-level action to the position of officers watching from afar.
It's a moment out of Tolstoy, in which the men really do resemble ants scrambling over a hill. Scores of them drop dead in their tracks, but the waves of specks keep advancing until they seem unstoppable. (Emerson)
That distant-shot type of camera movement does not come back until the latter battle scenes in Alsace, and never quite to the far-out observation level displayed on the Italian mountains described by Ebert. Bouchareb is deliberate in keeping us up-close and personal so that we can experience the journey with his protagonists, with the rare exception of the European French point of view, which seems more detached. The camera takes us with the men rather than make us contemplate them for far. We get a sense of how these men are being used by the French military, which is not as invested in them. On the contrary, the film is; it shows us their humanity through their experiences. The film brings us closer to the past and brings the past of these men up to the present to produce the encounter that Bouchareb’s narrative philosophy pursues in his films. This chapter analyzes how the film aims to rectify the omission of their contributions from
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the history of France, and how the meeting of these two cultures was indispensable to preserve the present-day Republic.
Spatial Analysis
The primary spaces in this picture are French, but Algerian spaces play an important secondary role. Because this film is shot primarily from the perspective of the immigrant, the Algerian space is from the outset filmed and viewed as a Place, in the meaning proposed by Augé with the following parameters:
These places have at least three characteristics in common. They want to be – people want them to be – places of identity, of relations and of history. The layout of the house, the rules of residence, the zoning of the village, placement of altars, configuration of public open spaces, land distribution, correspond for every individual to a system of possibilities, prescriptions and interdicts whose content is both spatial and social. To be born, is to be born into a place. In this sense the actual place of birth is a constituent of individual identity. (Augé 52-53)
La trahison established that the immigrants consider a Place the space that they occupy. The French servicemen, on the other hand, do not (through the camera we enter the natives’ homes and towns through the eyes of soldiers, ergo, as invaders who don’t belong). The film allows the viewer to turn the exotic space (from the French perspective) into a Place in its own right. The French use Algerian spaces to exclude the Harkis from both French and Algerian Places, but the film permits the public to see their spaces as Algerian Places and gives them a sense of validity.
Indigènes begins its journey in North African Places and deconstructs the position of France as an established Place by draping it in ambiguity. The film portrays France as a path rather than a
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destination (which is how the naïve Adbelkader constructs it at the beginning). It reconstructs France as a Non-Place by definition -again, as posited by Augé: “Clearly the word ‘Non-Place’
designates two complementary but distinct realities: spaces formed in relation to certain ends (transport, transit, commerce, leisure), and the relation that individuals have with these spaces”
(Augé 94)-. The temporality and danger that the North Africans experience in France identifies the whole country as a heterotopia of crisis and deviation. Except for the idealist, the relation of the Africans to France does become permanent, but rather one of transit. This distinction is also evident through the spoken word, which is an extension of the space15. The famous (or infamous) song ‘Nous sommes les africains’ (We are the Africans) plays the role of a unifying battle cry for all African troops. The song states that they are ‘leaving behind their homes in the colonies to save the fatherland’. Those lyrics point out how different these two spaces are for both colonial and metropolitan Frenchmen -and that the home, the Place, is Africa rather than France.
The editing of Indigènes also emphasizes the spatial and time separation. The same filmic device marks every change in space and lapse in time as a separate chapter through an aerial Black and White long shot of the countryside crossed over by a dark cloud. As the cloud passes over, the space that clears behind the cloud appears in color, and captions, such as ‘Algérie 1943’
or ‘Italie 1944’, announce the new time and place setting. Those shots remind the viewer of the turning of a page in a book. Each turning of the page takes the viewer to a new non-Place and defines visually the temporality of the space and time spent there by the men. Each turning of the
15 Augé explains how the word compliments the space that helps define the identity of an individual: “… and the words too, of all who speak the same language, and thus recognize that they belong to the same world. Place is completed through the word, through the allusive exchange of a few passwords between speakers who are conniving in private complicity” (Augé 76). We see this come to the fore in the films in question. Language as a definer of provenance and belonging is one of the main features in La trahison. Also, in Indigènes, the ‘we are the Africans’ hymn serves as an identifier of all of those whose native land is the colonial Fringe of France, and whose lingua franca is French but not likely their mother tongue. It is an imposed complicity that separates them from the European French and is ironically sang in French.