'Rebellion' is an account of events in the French South Pacific territory of New Caledonia. In 1988 a group of indigenous New Caledonians storm a police station in the territory, killing some police officers and taking still more hostage. Events quickly become caught up with the Mitterand v Chirac presidential election and the Parisian police sent to New Caledonia to deal with the situation find the army have taken over the operation - and the military's methods of tying village chiefs to trees and beating up women are turning the local population even more against the French.
The military are portrayed as gun-totin' buffoons without a shred of humanity and the politicians as self-serving vote-seeking machines. On the other hand, the police are self-sacrificing good guys and the terrorists family-loving, intelligent, reasonable chaps just one step below sainthood. This is not an unbiased film! It is also difficult for those not versed in French politics of the late 1980s to follow everything, not least because the English-language sub-titles use acronyms instead of the full, descriptive names of various organisations. The close, hand-held camera-work used during the forest battle scenes gives a good feel of how it must be in those confusing, noisy situations - but also makes it difficult for the viewer to follow events. Overall I enjoyed the novelty of a film set in the modern(ish) South Pacific, but this is far from unflawed.
