The action takes place in the heart of the Aurès, at the end of the 1940s. While the colonial administration was trying to put in place its structures and machinery, and was trying to subjugate the Algerian population, it quickly became apparent that the code of honor was not easily exchanged for the Napoleonic code. The recalcitrant then became outlaws in the eyes of the French authorities, and bandits of honor in the eyes of the population. Like Slimane when the army refused him permission to visit his dying father. He deserts on the spot but arrives too late in the village. Denounced by the kaid, tracked down and captured by the gendarmes, he escapes from prison to take revenge, in the company of two other prisoners, "honor bandits" like him. First feature-length film for Tewfik Fares' cinema, shot in the manner of Hollywood westerns, Les Hors la Loi relates in its own way the struggle against the colonial authority.