The film is considered one of the most influential political films in history, by Gillo Pontecorvo. Vividly re-creates a key year in the tumultuous Algerian struggle for independence from the occupying French in the 1950s. As violence escalates on both sides, children shoot soldiers at point-blank range, etc. Shot on the streets of Algiers in documentary style, the film is a case study in modern warfare, with its terrorist attacks and the brutal techniques used to combat them.

Originally released as a motion picture in 1966. Based on a true story by Saadi Yacef. Special features: Disc 1: Production gallery; Theatrical trailers. Disc 2: Gillo Pontecorvo : the dictatorship of truth (documentary of the director presented by literary critic Edward Said); Marxist poetry : the making of The battle of Algiers; Five directors (interviews with filmmakers Spike Lee, Mira Nair, Julian Schnabel, Steven Soderbergh, and Oliver Stone on the film's influence, style, and importance). Disc 3: Remembering history (documentary on the Algerian experience of the battle for independence); "États d'armes" (documentary excerpt featuring senior French military officers recalling the use of torture and execution to combat the Algerian rebellion); A case study (program featuring U.S. counterterrorism experts Christopher Isham, Richard A. Clarke, and Michael A. Sheehan); Return to Algiers (documentary in which the filmmaker revisits the country after three decades of independence). Booklet featuring a new essay by film scholar Peter Matthews, a reprinted interview with cowriter Franco Solinas, and biographical sketches of key figures in the French-Algerian War by political science scholar Arun Kapil.

disc 1. The film -- disc 2. Pontecorvo and the film -- disc 3. The film and history.