2006-02-28

2 Good Movies

Below are reviews of two movies made about the 1994 genocide in Rwanda: Hotel Rwanda and Sometimes in April.  I recommend both of them.  For those of you unfamiliar with the events, Rwanda has two "classes" of people, the Tutsi and the Hutu.  These terms were basically given to them by the Belgians during colonialism.  The Hutu outnumber the Tutsi by a considerable margin, and when the Belgians were in power, they installed all Tutsis as leaders.  When they left, they made the Hutu leaders, and the Hutu resented what had happened to them during the last several decades.  In the early 90s this resentment built up so much that in April of 1994, after peace talks failed and the president of Rwanda died, the Hutus began killing all of the Tutsis and their supporters.  A radio station, RTLM, played a large role in the genocide through propoganda and even helped organize some attacks on civilians.  By July, a Tutsi resistance force was able to claim most of the country, but not before a million people had died.  During this time, western nations and organizations, including the UN and the USA did practically nothing to stop the genocide.  A famous scene from one of the movies shows real footage of a US State Department official being questioned on the matter.  She says that they are aware of "acts of genocide" occuring.  The reporter asks how many acts of genocide does it take to make genocide, to which the politics of Africa creep in.  Now, for the reviews:
 
Hotel Rwanda, based upon true events in that country during the 1994 genocide.  Good movie and supposedly very accurate, but accuracy or not, it seemed very hollywood-like.  First off, the main two characters are played by stars Don Cheadle and Nick Nolte. Without giving too much of the story away HR shows us how the manager of the Hôtel des Mille Collines saved over 1200 tutsis and moderate hutus from almost certain death by bribing those in authority and using his connections in the military.  His wife is a tutsi and his children are considered half-breeds, so part of his determination is to save them, but he goes beyond just that, and overall its a good movie.
 
Another movie documenting the genocide in Rwanda is Sometimes in April, which I consider to be much better--though much darker--than Hotel Rwanda.  This movie does not have any big name stars in it, and it was actually made by HBO.  Similarly to HR, the main character of the story is a hutu who is married to a tutsi.  He attempts to save his family by getting them out of the country, but unlike HR, he finds much less success and much more death.  This movie is much more graphic in depicting the treatment of the victims and really giving you the feel of what it was like to be in Rwanda for those several months. 

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Very interesting. Thanks for posting about those movies. I've heard of Hotel Rwanda and never knew exactly what it was about.
One thing I must comment on is that I'm surprised America stayed out of it. In a way, it's kinda good they didn't get involved or else we may have had problems. America should stay out of other country's affairs.

Anonymous said...

i've watched hotel rwanda, but not sometimes in april, so i'll have to check it out. i will agree with carl - it's never a good idea for america to mess w/another country's internal affairs. Choosing sides should be avoided when at all possible.