“Outside the Law” is the companion film to 2006’s “Days of Glory” from Rachid Bouchared, where Glory detailed the almost orgotten history of Algerian importance in the liberation of France in WW2, (a horrific blight on Allied Forces that these soldiers, about to enter victoriously in Paris in 1944, were replaced with more photogenic white soldiers).
”Outside the Law” is the struggle for independence for Algeria in a guerrilla war against France on her own soil.It begins in 1928 with the appropriation of land from Algerian farmers and moves through to the early 50’s when 3 brothers we initially meet as young boys leaving their ancestral home are now 3 very distant, sadly quite shallow stereotypes. There is the thief, the scholar (he wears glasses) and the one in the middle; and this sentence is in fact more character development than you will see in the entire 2hrs 20 mins.
The majority of the film takes place in a Algerian community outside Paris, a dilapidated, hut-strewn landscape. Here, it is an origin story of the NLF (National Liberation Front) who, by the seeming ease and simplicity of their inception, will have the more politically aware viewer squirming slightly at the overly simple moral and tactical awareness of these people. The actual history of the time is often overlooked by needlessly simple plot excursions in this film. A boxing division that leads to a hilarious inept choreographed fight, a wedged-in affair with a woman who is never fully explained. Who is she? Why is she given vast amounts of cash by the National Liberation Front? It seems every concrete truth in this film has been glossed over to serve a non-existent plot. The FLN were a very vicious organisation who fought as much with the rival party as with the French government. Here, it is a historical backdrop for a story of brothers who are defined by their place in events.
It’s a circle of ignorance where the story is inherited from history, but both are weighed down by the other’s insecurities. The facts are diluted to cater for characters who are inherantly defined by the era. It’s a paradox that keeps playing with key moments in the film until eventually you realise that nothing is being confronted - race, religion, imperialism. Issues that still face France today are never mentioned. When compared to the “Battle of Algiers”, one of the finest films ever made in my opinion, which deals, documentary-style, with the Algerian cause, it is at once irrelevant. The history is complex and fascinating, this is a timid story where a brutal one should be told.
