Framing a Terrorist: The Politics of Representation in Ici et ailleurs (1970–1974), Four Lions (2010), and Essential Killing (2010)

This essay discusses two recent European films presenting Muslims as terrorists: Four Lions (Christopher Morris, UK/FR, 2010) and Essential Killing (Jerzy Skolimowski, PL/NO/IE/HU/FR, 2010). My objective is to capture their specific political agenda, as conveyed by their content and form, most importantly their characterization of the main protagonists and the use of montage. In order to tease out their distinctiveness, I will situate them against the background of Ici et ailleurs/Here and Elsewhere (Jean-Luc Godard and Anne-Marie Miéville, FR, 1970–1974), which depicts the Palestinian struggle to regain their homeland taken by Israel and debates its own method of presentation of political events.

The reason I choose Morris and Skolimowski’s films from many recently made on the topic of Muslim terrorism is that they provide excellent material to appreciate how different a Muslim terrorist might be “framed” and how this framing depends on the “habitus” in which a specific filmmaker operates, such as his national background, the source of finance, the genre s/he uses, and the target audience, as well as his/her political views and intentions. This is because Godard’s film belongs to a different period, marked by the Cold War and a widespread commitment of Western filmmakers to the socialist project, while the political context of the new films is the “War on Terror” and a decline of interest in socialism. Comparing Four Lions and Essential Killing allows us to gain some insight into the political climate in which they were made. Moreover, although not to the same extent as Godard and Miéville’s film, they not only represent terrorists, but also engage in a debate about representing them and especially about differences between representation (from outside) and self-representation.

Before I move to discussing these films, I shall make two comments. First, although I recognize the fact that there are many different Muslims, in this essay I will focus on the image of the Muslim terrorist, because the films scrutinized by me define their characters in this way. This can be seen as reflecting that they are made by “outsiders,” namely European non-Muslim directors. However, I will comment, when appropriate, on other characteristics of the protagonists, such as their ethnic background. Secondly, I shall explain my use of the word “terrorism.” The Oxford English Dictionary defines terrorism as “violent acts which are committed against the law, perpetrated for a specific political or ideological goal, intended to create terror and target the civilian population.” However, various authors point to the fact that there is much disagreement whether a particular act should be labeled in this way. For example, in his book, The Age of Terrorism, Walter Laqueur maintains: “The difficulty with terrorism is that there is no terrorism per se, except perhaps on an abstract level, but different terrorisms.”¹ Stefan Wolff adds: “No act of violence in itself carries the quality of terrorism, only its interpretation does.”² This is reflected in saying that one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.

These and other authors point to different ideologies, leading to terrorist attacks, different strategies used by terrorists, as well as contrasting moral assessments of those who engage in them. The situation is further complicated by the fact that in the past many terrorists, especially those fighting against the colonial order, such as Jewish terrorist groups operating in the British mandate of Palestine, did not object this label, even wore it with pride,³ while today “terrorism” and “terrorist” are derogatory terms. Denigration of terrorism is frequently achieved by strategies of Orientalization. A “terrorist” fits well and draws on the Orientalist stereotype of the East as violent, irrational, and despotic, in contrast to the image of the West as rational, ordered, and democratic.⁴

Moreover, terrorism is typically equated with violence perpetrated by non-state actors, although occasionally one encounters expressions such as a “state terrorism,” referring to states whose actions toward their own citizens or those from other countries are marked by a...