The Uprooted

At a glance

The Uprooted, is a 1977 Algerian movie, directed by Mohamed Lamine Merbah, and starring Hassan El-Hassani, Keltoum (Aïcha Adjouri), Hadj Smaine Mohamed Seghir. with a runtime of 120 minutes.

Overview

Les Déracinés (The Uprooted) is an Algerian historical epic set in 1880, during the height of French colonial rule over Algeria. When authorities decide to dispossess Algerian peasants in the Ouarsenis mountain range and transfer their ancestral lands to French settlers, two brutal methods are deployed: outright violent force, or crippling fines engineered to be unpayable. Unable to resist, the uprooted farmers are driven from their villages into the slums of colonial cities, swelling the ranks of the urban poor. A powerful indictment of colonial land seizure, the film recovers a chapter of Algerian history shaped by displacement, dispossession, and resistance.

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