“The Olive Trees of Justice” – A sparse crop [MOVIE REVIEW]
Pierre Prothon as Jean walking the streets of Algiers in “The Olive Trees of Justice.” Photo courtesy of Kino Lorber. It’s 1961 and Jean has returned to the Algeria of his birth to visit his dying father. The war against the French is still raging and the schism between the native population and the colonialist occupiers has grown even more intense. Jean, who grew up on the family farm in the Mitidja plain outside Algiers surrounded by vineyards and fruit trees, is as shocked by his parents’ diminished circumstances as he is by the tanks on the streets and the helicopters in the air. The war has been going on for 8 years and one can hear the death rattle of the French army as their grasp over this colony is at an end. Jean’s entire adult life has been in Paris with his wife and children; he was eager to leave Algeria behind. His father, a bad businessman, lost the farm in a series of bad investments. His wife and sister insist that it was because he was too kind to his workers and listened to the wrong people. But even on his deathbed, Jean’s father refuses to blame others. He was the very embodiment of noblesse oblige to his former field hands. James Blue, the director, uses a…
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