Women: The perfect agents

There are many instances in The Battle of Algiers in which females play important roles. However, these roles are almost never active, with only one notable exception. Although they are recognized by the NFL as valuable allies, they are relegated almost exclusively to passive roles. This dismissiveness continues even in instances where they would be more useful without the presence of men. While an argument can be made that the NFL is trying to protect the inherent advantage they hold of being able to send out faceless assistants to their killers and agents, this argument weakens considerably under careful scrutiny. The movie depicts too many scenes in which the NFL (as well as the French) are simply too blinded by their societal preconceptions to realize the full impact of women as possible warriors. Women in The Battle of Algiers are consistently viewed as anything but equal to men, a role which simultaneously protects and sidelines them as the central conflict unfolds.

Women are consistently viewed as untouchable, a view that is only exacerbated by their white veils and protective clothing. When crossing the blockade, many of the Arab men are searched thoroughly with full body checks, while the women cross through unmolested. This is in part due to the culture from which both the men and the women come, in which any attempt to search a woman would cause a scandal. This protects their weapon ferrying from the eyes of the French. The French are equally party to the idea of keeping the dirty work from the women. When the men (including the police inspector) drive to the Casbah at night to plant the firebomb, they conspicuously leave their wives at home, without mentioning their ultimate destination to any of them (at least, not in any noticeable fashion). This prejudice against treating women as combatants protects the NFL time and time again from both the French policemen and the paratroopers. When the paratroopers line up strikers in an attempt to send them back to work, it is worth noticing that they only round up men. The women are left to wait for their return, as is evinced by the waiting women at the blockade, and otherwise put out of mind. This deference – or insulting devaluation, as it could as be taken – puts the women in a position to act as the perfect agents of the NFL.

The NFL seems to realize this advantage, but fails to take full advantage of it. When the NFL seeks to commit murders, they have men take the shots, only to return the weapon to the women shortly afterwards. Having the women shoot the NFL’s targets would not only be less conspicuous, as they could fire from beneath their veils, but would also eliminate the chance that the male NFL member would be caught. This inconsistency lies in the culture from which the NFL’s member’s proceed, in  which it would be, ironically, womanish to allow women to do all the fighting. To further this point, when the leaders of the resistance decide to move to new hideouts disguised as women, the method of their travel seems to be largely a novel surprise, judging by their failure to change out of boots and the lack of immediate comprehension on the part of Ali and the others when Jaffar mentions his plan. This form of travel allows a quick and anonymous way to cross the city, and it seems that it would be one of the first steps the NFL would take, but they instead seem to be surprised by it. Instead, the NFL seems to confine their women to passive roles, such as hiding resistance fighters (such as Jaffar and Ali) from their pursuers and distributing weapons. Only one major break from this trend occurs in the film, when the three Arab women place the bombs that destroy the café, dance salon, and the airport, but by and large the film avoids women taking such active roles in the war.

Discussion Questions:

What makes the incident with the bombs special enough to merit women taking an active role? Does the fact that they dress as Europeans add or diminish the breaking of custom?