While watching the Battle of Algiers, I knew that the events surrounding the movie were based on real life events, but I had no idea that some of the characters were actually real life people. Ali, for example, actually was a real life FLN guerrilla and was known as the hero of Casbah. General Mathieu was also based on the French general Jacques Massu. In the movie, the Algerian women who dressed up in Western clothing and bombed the french establishments also actually happened. I found this out from an interesting article about the movie. The article also explains some of the things that the movie had left out such as insurrection that was taking place in the rest of Algeria. http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2003/08/the_pentagons_film_festival.html