#091: (Pt. 2) Detroit / Battle of Algiers

The Next Picture Show

Filmspotting

Tv & Film, Film History, Film Reviews

4.6 • 858 Ratings

🗓️ 24 August 2017

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Like Gillo Pontecorvo’s BATTLE OF ALGIERS, Kathryn Bigalow’s new film DETROIT expresses a strong point of view on racial injustice through a careful recreation of a real historical event — and also like BATTLE OF ALGIERS, it’s stirred up some controversy surrounding its docu-journalistic approach. We unpack that controversy, and DETROIT more generally, before diving into how the two films compare in their visceral style, their portrayals of law enforcement, their use of female characters, and more. Plus, Your Next Picture Show, where we share recent filmgoing experiences in hopes of putting something new on your cinematic radar. Please share your comments, thoughts, and questions about THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS, DETROIT, or both by sending an email to comments@nextpictureshow.net, or leaving a short voicemail at (773) 234-9730. Your Next Picture Show: • Tasha: Dave McCary’s BRIGSBY BEAR • Keith: Sabaah Folayan and Damon Davis’ WHOSE STREETS? and Ronal Neame’s HOPSCOTCH • Scott: Gillo Pontecorvo’s BURN • Genevieve: Amanda Lipitz’s STEP Outro music: The Roots, “It Ain’t Fair” Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Adobe Express is the quick and easy create anything out.
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0:10.7	Search for Adobe Express to find out more and use it for free.
0:16.4	It's very difficult to keep the line between the past and the present.
0:20.1	Do you believe that someone out of the past can enter and take possession of a living being?
0:26.9	We may be true with the past, but the past is not through with us.
0:33.5	Welcome back to the next picture show, movie the week podcast devoted to a classic film in the way it shaped our thoughts on a recent release.
0:40.0	I'm Scott Tobias here again with...
0:41.6	Keithups.
0:42.3	Toshares.
0:43.0	On the first half of this episode, we discussed the Battle of Algiers, Gilo Ponte Corvo's classic political thriller about insurgency and counterinsurgency in the French Algerian War.
0:53.4	Now we bring in Detroit, which uses a similar docu-journalistic technique to cover a violent
0:58.1	incident of the Algiers Motel during the Detroit riots of 1967.
1:02.4	Detroit is the latest in a series of political thrillers by director Catherine Vigolo
1:06.1	and journalist turned screenwriter Mark Bull, who previously collaborated on the
1:09.9	Hurt Locker in Zero Dark
1:11.1	30. And much like the Battle of Algiers, it expresses a strong point of view on racial injustice
1:15.9	through a careful recreation of a real historical event. John Boyega stars as our chief witness,
1:21.5	a black security guard named Melvin Dismukes, who responds to a report of sniper fire coming
1:26.2	from the annex building of the Algiers
1:27.8	Motel. What Dismukes sees is an all-white local police unit using unlawful tactics to
1:33.7	terrorize the mostly black guests into giving up the shooter. Led by Will Polter is Philip
	...

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