Chronicle of the Years of Fire (1975)

Cannes Film Festival, 1975, Chronicle of the Burning Years by Mohamed Lakhdar-Hamina receives the Palme d'Or. This is a first for an African film. A meticulous chronicle of the evolution of the Algerian national movement from 1939 until the outbreak of the revolution on November 1, 1954, the film unequivocally demonstrates that the "Algerian War" is not an accident of history, but a slow process of revolts and suffering, uninterrupted, from the start of colonization in 1830, until this "Red All Saints' Day" of November 1, 54. Composed of six chapters, the film paints the merciless picture of political and warlike history of colonial Algeria. The result is grandiose. From the beauty of the ocher images of the desert to the light of the still faces, from the power of the crowd movements to the force of the subject, a broad fresco emerges, epic and lyrical at the same time, punctuated by droughts, famines, typhus and riots. At its center, Ahmed gradually awakens to political consciousness against colonization, under the gaze of his son, symbol of the new Algeria, and that of Miloud, half-mad haranguer, half-prophet, incarnation of popular memory of the revolt, the liberation of Algeria and its people. Lakhdar-Hamina will receive his Palme d'Or in a stormy atmosphere, triggering the awakening of the veterans of the OAS, fiercely nostalgic for French Algeria; who went so far as to threaten the filmmaker with death, and trigger a series of bomb threats throughout the festival. Never before had a film caused such a political scandal in France. Its restoration in 2021 reveals all its grandeur, technical and artistic, and its universal humanist scope.