In Mansourah, You Separated Us

For the first time since the Algerian War of Independence (1954-1962), Malek, the father of director Dorothée Myriam Kellou, returns to Mansourah, the village where he was born. During the war, the French Army forcibly transported more than two million Algerians to resettlement camps. Back in his childhood home, Malek and his daughter try to imagine what exactly happened, and why most people have remained silent about it for all these years. Few know about the destruction of the villages, yet the consequences for the rural people were huge.

We hear how during the war, in their fight against the Algerian National Liberation Front, the French Army set up a camp in Malek’s village. A witness looks back in horror at the truck in which he was transported as a boy to an unknown destination. According to an elderly man, the consequences of the forced resettlement are palpable to this day. We also hear from a traumatized man responsible for multiple murders. Their testimonies shed light on an appalling and neglected history.