Between 1980 and 1985, René Vautier recorded the testimonies of people who had experienced, observed or analyzed the Algerian conflict: Mohamed Moulay, Ali Rouchaï, Mohamed Loulli, Germaine Tillion, Paul Teitgen, Pierre-Vidal Naquet, Colonel Antoine Argoud, Generals Jacques Pâris de la Bollardière and Jacques Massu, but also anonymous people and victims of the Algerian War of Independence. He planned to create in images, another history of the war, such as it had never been shown, "an audiovisual history of the Algerian War, told by those who, French or Algerian, experienced it in their flesh".

This project entitled Images to write History together will not see the light of day as such. But, at the request of the journalists from Canard Enchaîné accused by Jean-Marie Le Pen for an article denouncing the past torturer of the European deputy, the filmmaker made available to the justice system, part of these rushes as evidence before the 17th correctional chamber in 1984. He then made A propos de l'autre détail, a historical and current affairs film based on the testimonies of Algerian victims tortured during the war. As these witnesses disappear, their stories become valuable archives for writing a common Franco-Algerian history. A propos de… l'autre détail sheds light on the activist career of René Vautier in his troubles with the French justice system. On June 22, 1988, the filmmaker was tried for having said that Jean-Marie Le Pen was "a presidential candidate with bloody hands". He asked that this politician, then a European deputy, be brought before a court like Kurt Waldheim in Austria. This documentary, both historical and current, calls upon Pierre Vidal-Naquet, Germaine Tillion, Colonel Antoine Argoud, Rouchtaï Cherki Ali. It is an opportunity for the filmmaker to discuss sensitive subjects: the Algerian conflict, torture, France's relationship with its troubled past and freedom of expression. But this film is the subject of an edit, a sort of synthesis because several kilometers of film were ransacked in 1984. However, René Vautier had filmed several hours between 1980 and 1985 for a project that was to be called Images to Write History. For him, the ardor put into destroying these testimonies reinforces the idea that it is necessary to disseminate them. We are witnessing here a reflection on the consequences of amnesty laws on the writing of History, initiated very early by Henri Alleg and Pierre Vidal-Naquet. We now know that the French National Assembly recognized the existence of a "war" in Algeria in 1999, 37 years after the end of the war! It is also relevant to place the film About the Other Detail in the history of the development of amnesty laws that began with the Evian Accords and was implemented by two decrees signed on March 22, 1962 and five ordinances published in April.

In this same perspective, the criminal amnesty of the activists of French Algeria and the Organization of the Secret Army (AOS) was implemented by three laws promulgated on December 23, 1964, June 17, 1966, and July 31, 1968. This history shows, in fact, that any debate on the conflict (in which René Vautier participates here) is muzzled by criminal sanctions.