While "The Battle of Algiers" is the most famous movie of that revolution, "The Olive Trees of Justice" was the only feature film made during the time of conflict. The film, based on Jean Pelegri.s book of the same name, won the 1962 Critic's Prize at Cannes. While the conflict is central to the story, the film is not concerned with particulars; it relates feelings about the French/Algerian situation more than the situation itself.
The film follows its lead, Jean, as he deals with his father's illness that has brought him back from Paris to the country in which he was raised. His father had been one of the first to farm the great plain of Algeria and believes he improved the land and conditions for the native population, but he lost his farm long ago, and now lays dying in a small city apartment as Jean's mother tends father and frets. As Jean sees his father after all these many years, he recalls the bucolic life growing up on the farm, and we see this in flashback.
Throughout the film viewers are given a window to Jean's memories, and in each case, we see a wonderful switch between two very different styles of filming. The scenes with Jean as an adult use Humanism / Cinema Verite styled techniques to show actual streets, people, and military check points in the city. We see a crowded market where Algerian vendors sell to Colonials, and watch as the camera is moved through the mass of activity. When Jean remembers his boyhood, the shots are perfectly framed, in perfect focus, and reminiscent of John Ford's style of American Cinema. Take for example the lovely scene of Jean remembering the vineyard where the camera is on the ground looking up at a space framed by grape leaves, stems, and bunches. The father is on the left holding a single glistening grape in center frame so young Jean (right) can see its perfection.
To contrast the rosy picture of French beneficence we get from the father, we meet Jean's boyhood friends as adults, an ex-neighbor/farmer who's turned bitter, and depicts how not all French were as ... 'kind' to their laborers as Jean's family was. It also lingers on captures a variety of people Jean passes while roaming the streets -- revealing a contrast between the relative comfort of French controlled areas and the poverty of the ethnic Algerian slums.
After the film, speaker Gerald O'Grady, executor of director James Blue's estate, said that when the book was written, the author, Pelegri truly hoped that the tensions between the factions could be resolved. Pelegri loved Algeria, and did not want conflict. By the time the film was released, however, most everyone realized that there would be no reconciliation between French Colonials and Algerians. This comment summarized the theme of several films.