Idealist or opportunist? Terror’s Advocate can’t decide, but puts the lawyer in the dock for the unsavoury characters he could call on for references, including student chum Pol Pot.
A French/Vietnamese anti-colonialist, Verges found international fame defending 1960s Algerian freedom fighters, notably Djamila Bouhired, whom he transformed into a Joan of Arc figure and promptly married.
Settling into divorce case tedium, he went into hiding from 1970–78, maybe forming contacts in Cambodia and China.
But Schroeder is unable to get Verges to confess anything incriminating (after all, this is the lawyer who took on 49 prosecutors in the Barbie case), so opts for guilt by association.
Professionally and personally, he rubbed shoulders with the Baader Meinhof Gang, Action Directe, the PLO, Islamic extremists and African dictators.
With his laser intellect, unflappable confidence, buzz cut hair and penchant for fine cigars and beautiful female terrorists (he also fell for Carlos the Jackal’s squeeze), Verges could be a real-life super villain, whose “rupture defence” (turning a country’s inglorious human rights record on itself in the courtroom), is a nefarious weapon of mass distraction.
Terror’s Advocate also makes a compelling study of post-WW2 terrorism, suggesting the current climate of extremism was made possible by a European cashflow and an army of lawyers willing to take orders from jailed leaders to soldiers on the streets.
Sharp eyes and ears are required to keep track of the talking heads and groups popping up, but Schroeder employs good archive footage to illustrate his claims.
Where the film fails is in pinning its subject down on the moral questions of his choices, or teasing out his political standpoint – although Carlos the Jackal labels him an opportunist.
The jury may be out on Verges the man, but there is plenty here to deliberate.
Rob Daniel
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