Zineb Sedira

Part of Zineb Sedira's art installation for the French Pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale. A piece where Sedira explores her passion for the militant cinema of the 60s and 70s.

On October 4, 2018, France celebrated the 60th anniversary of the Fifth Republic. It is a republic born in the throes of the Algerian War and one which—from the day it was founded by General de Gaulle until the presidency of a very Jupiterian Emmanuel Macron—has been assailed as a “Republican monarchy” by partisans of a more assertive parliamentarian state. By revisiting the struggle of those who dared oppose the new regime — only to suffer a crushing defeat on September 28, 1958, when they were barely able to garner 20% of the vote against the constitutional text — this film shines a powerful new light on the origins of the Fifth Republic and its consequences for the next 60 years.  It is a constitutional debate that planted the seeds for a complete upheaval of the French political landscape, on the left in particular, and set the country in motion toward what would be called the Union of the Left.

From 1954 to 1962, during the Algerian War, French citizens provided concrete assistance to the FLN in France: sheltering refugees, forging documents, facilitating border crossings, and transporting funds. Whether committed to the ideals of the Republic or driven by Third Worldist revolutionaries, they sought to build a bridge of friendship between nations. They paid for their commitment with imprisonment and exile. Four veterans of the Jeanson network recall this period. Today, they are no longer seen as traitors or heroes, but as witnesses recounting "their" war... Silent for 30 years, the "Jeanson network" now bears witness to this history.

Documentary edited from testimonies on the torture of people who experienced the war. Some witnesses were tortured by Jean-Marie Le Pen. These testimonies will help defend the newspaper Le Canard Enchaîné in court against Jean-Marie Le Pen for defamation. The film was shown in 1985 during the trial and some witnesses also came to support the newspaper. But the 1963 amnesty law protects the politician, prohibiting the use of images that could harm people who served during the Algerian war.

“In Algeria, we are restoring order, what we mean by French order,” declared Michel Debré, Prime Minister, under the presidency of Charles De Gaulle, in April 1956. It was, of course, order colonial in defiance of the republican order, in Algeria as in Paris where, on October 17, 1961, Algerians flocking from suburban slums were massacred by the police of prefect Maurice Papon, while they were peacefully marching for the independence of their country. On October 17, 2001, a commemorative plaque was placed in Paris on the Saint-Michel bridge: "In memory of the many Algerians killed during the bloody repression of the peaceful demonstration of October 17, 1961." A surge of racial hatred, less than 20 years after the roundup of the Jews in July 1942. An Algerian, victim of this roundup, told us, holding back his tears, "I still have nightmares."

"Djazaïrouna", produced by the cinema service of the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic (GPRA), is a montage film intended to inform the international community at the UN in 1959 on the objectives pursued by the Algerian resistance during the war of 'Algeria. Independence in Algeria (1954-1962). In 1959, Djamel-Eddine Chanderli and Mohammed Lakdar-Hamina produced Djazaïrouna (Our Algeria) from images taken by René Vautier and Doctor Pierre Chaulet. This film, completed a little later and will result in the film “The Voice of the People”. This documentary on the history of Algeria through a montage of current events, traces the political and military actions of the A.L.N, the demonstrations of December 1960, and the attack on a fortified French base on the border between Algeria and Tunisia.

"Algeria, The Two Soldiers" tells the true story of two young French soldiers during the Algerian War, who were driven in two completely opposite directions by the same keen sense of honor: Noël Favrelière deserted to free a young Algerian Muslim prisoner who was going to be executed, and René Técourt, to continue the fight for French Algeria alongside the OAS ultras. Two emblematic examples, which describe in a direct, carnal way, what happened there.