Hotel Rwanda
When I was in high school, the TV mini series Holocaust aired. Like much of the TV I watched over 20 years ago, I can only remember bits and pieces of the show. Mostly.
I vividly recall the horror of the Auschwitz "shower" scenes, the herding of bald, naked, emaciated women and men and children into large rooms for "delousing", the locking of the doors, the tablets of poisonous Zyklon-B dropped through cleverly designed holes in the ceiling, the gas that looked like steam, the screams and moans of those inside as they choked to death, the piles of bodies left to be burned, the inhuman satisfaction of the Nazi guards. I can close my eyes and see this re-creation of history's greatest crime, and I see it not as acting, but as reality, as if it was filmed live, as it happened.
These scenes helped me, and I am sure many others, make a visual connection to the stories of the Holocaust that, somehow, the written word alone cannot convey. And I know that, later, as I read more about World War 2, these scenes also helped me try to understand the true evil that had taken place, just decades before.
Hotel Rwanda, which I just rented and watched, hopefully, has the same effect today.
I have mixed feelings about the movie.
First, let me say that Don Cheadle, the lead, is the best actor working today. I just wish he'd make more movies. (Do yourself a favor and rent Out of Sight, probably the best Elmore Leonard movie adaptation, starring George Clooney and, of all people, J Lo. They are both very good, but Cheadle steals the movie with the playing a very, very bad guy named Snoopy.)
And he does not disappoint playing Paul Rusesabagina, a Hutu (the majority) trying to save over 1000 Tutsi (the minority) by sheltering them in the 5 star hotel that he manages, during the Rwandan conflict of 1994. A compelling story, the movie has been called an African Schindler's List.
But I have to say that I was a little disappointed, the movie's relatively weak script and, (other than Cheadle) very thinly drawn characters took away from the urgency of the drama. Nick Nolte has a couple of interesting scenes, but Liam Neeson barely shows up.
And, surprisingly, I thought that the movie actually underplayed the horror of the massacres. There was no scene that even came close to the simple brutality of the Holocaust Auschwitz shower scenes.
But I suppose any attempt to represent the actual events would have turned the movie into the bloodiest film ever made. Around 1 million men, women, and children murdered, mostly hacked to death with machetes, in a little over three months. About 10,000 murders per day.
The most "efficient" slaughter in history.
The only scene that allows the viewer to glimpse this scale of the genocide, while effective, is filmed (purposely?) in pre-dawn foggy half-light. Its almost as if the makers of the movie were afraid to show the bodies, to reveal the true horror. And, while I don't want to give away the ending, lets just say that it potentially lets the audience off the hook.
The movie is disturbing, but you probably will have a full night's sleep after it. Considering the story, you shouldn't.
Also, this is not a criticism, just an observation, but at the end of the movie, while it is pointed out that close to 1 million Rwandans died in the 100 days of the fighting - almost all civilians, it is not mentioned that three times that many were killed in the subsequent civil war that spilled over into Burundi and the Congo.
Four million dead in the space of a few years.
While the genocide that the movie focuses on is clearly seen as a result of the ambivalence of the west, the UN, US, France and Britain are all chastised (rightly in my opinion) for not doing enough to stop the killing, the war that followed is not as easily pinned on foreign governments. African leaders, particularly Laurent Kabila of the Congo, exploited the Hutu/Tutsi hatred well after the Rwandan genocide of 1994 "stopped". Refugee camps became military bases, humanitarian aid indirectly funded weapons purchases and army salaries, and the slaughter continued. A more aggressive intervention may have stopped the killing momentarily, but may only have delayed the inevitable civil war(s).
Flaws aside, this is still a better movie than most. Cheadle, as mentioned, is just an incredible actor, and the film would be worth watching just to see him. I'd pay to watch him read the back of a cereal box, and he does deliver his usual flawless performance.
And, because of the story, a true horror story, Hotel Rwanda should be seen by everyone. Really. An average movie about an important, real-life subject is worth your time more than a well made piece of fiction, and certainly more than most movies that are out there today.
This Friday night, you may want to rent the latest Adam Sandler or Vin Diesel masterpiece instead, but, for once, don't. Rent this. Watch it with your family. Talk about it.
Read about it
And, then ask "why?", but don't settle for the simple answers - "its western colonialism", "its tribal history", "its the UN".
When basically good people are confronted with pure evil, the temptation is to pick a simple answer and run with it. But the tragedy in Rwanda was not the "fault" of the UN, or Bill Clinton and the US, or ex-colonialist Europe, or the African leadership and military. Some combination of these actors, and the rotting African economic and governmental system has led to failed states and economies like Rwanda's, from Angola to Zimbabwe, over the last 50 years. Making analysis even more complicated, the cycle of aid, corruption, and dependence that a generous world has created to try and "solve" poverty and hunger in Africa has, lately, also been recognized part of the problem.
The Rwandan genocide was a symptom of a complex and insidious disease, not the disease itself.
.
This complexity makes it harder to answer "why", harder to say "that's horrible" and "go back to our dinners" as one American journalist points out in the movie. But responding with guilt or blind anger and accusations does no one any good. The answers are somewhere in between.
The least we can do is try, very hard, to understand.
I vividly recall the horror of the Auschwitz "shower" scenes, the herding of bald, naked, emaciated women and men and children into large rooms for "delousing", the locking of the doors, the tablets of poisonous Zyklon-B dropped through cleverly designed holes in the ceiling, the gas that looked like steam, the screams and moans of those inside as they choked to death, the piles of bodies left to be burned, the inhuman satisfaction of the Nazi guards. I can close my eyes and see this re-creation of history's greatest crime, and I see it not as acting, but as reality, as if it was filmed live, as it happened.
These scenes helped me, and I am sure many others, make a visual connection to the stories of the Holocaust that, somehow, the written word alone cannot convey. And I know that, later, as I read more about World War 2, these scenes also helped me try to understand the true evil that had taken place, just decades before.
Hotel Rwanda, which I just rented and watched, hopefully, has the same effect today.
I have mixed feelings about the movie.
First, let me say that Don Cheadle, the lead, is the best actor working today. I just wish he'd make more movies. (Do yourself a favor and rent Out of Sight, probably the best Elmore Leonard movie adaptation, starring George Clooney and, of all people, J Lo. They are both very good, but Cheadle steals the movie with the playing a very, very bad guy named Snoopy.)
And he does not disappoint playing Paul Rusesabagina, a Hutu (the majority) trying to save over 1000 Tutsi (the minority) by sheltering them in the 5 star hotel that he manages, during the Rwandan conflict of 1994. A compelling story, the movie has been called an African Schindler's List.
But I have to say that I was a little disappointed, the movie's relatively weak script and, (other than Cheadle) very thinly drawn characters took away from the urgency of the drama. Nick Nolte has a couple of interesting scenes, but Liam Neeson barely shows up.
And, surprisingly, I thought that the movie actually underplayed the horror of the massacres. There was no scene that even came close to the simple brutality of the Holocaust Auschwitz shower scenes.
But I suppose any attempt to represent the actual events would have turned the movie into the bloodiest film ever made. Around 1 million men, women, and children murdered, mostly hacked to death with machetes, in a little over three months. About 10,000 murders per day.
The most "efficient" slaughter in history.
The only scene that allows the viewer to glimpse this scale of the genocide, while effective, is filmed (purposely?) in pre-dawn foggy half-light. Its almost as if the makers of the movie were afraid to show the bodies, to reveal the true horror. And, while I don't want to give away the ending, lets just say that it potentially lets the audience off the hook.
The movie is disturbing, but you probably will have a full night's sleep after it. Considering the story, you shouldn't.
Also, this is not a criticism, just an observation, but at the end of the movie, while it is pointed out that close to 1 million Rwandans died in the 100 days of the fighting - almost all civilians, it is not mentioned that three times that many were killed in the subsequent civil war that spilled over into Burundi and the Congo.
Four million dead in the space of a few years.
While the genocide that the movie focuses on is clearly seen as a result of the ambivalence of the west, the UN, US, France and Britain are all chastised (rightly in my opinion) for not doing enough to stop the killing, the war that followed is not as easily pinned on foreign governments. African leaders, particularly Laurent Kabila of the Congo, exploited the Hutu/Tutsi hatred well after the Rwandan genocide of 1994 "stopped". Refugee camps became military bases, humanitarian aid indirectly funded weapons purchases and army salaries, and the slaughter continued. A more aggressive intervention may have stopped the killing momentarily, but may only have delayed the inevitable civil war(s).
Flaws aside, this is still a better movie than most. Cheadle, as mentioned, is just an incredible actor, and the film would be worth watching just to see him. I'd pay to watch him read the back of a cereal box, and he does deliver his usual flawless performance.
And, because of the story, a true horror story, Hotel Rwanda should be seen by everyone. Really. An average movie about an important, real-life subject is worth your time more than a well made piece of fiction, and certainly more than most movies that are out there today.
This Friday night, you may want to rent the latest Adam Sandler or Vin Diesel masterpiece instead, but, for once, don't. Rent this. Watch it with your family. Talk about it.
Read about it
And, then ask "why?", but don't settle for the simple answers - "its western colonialism", "its tribal history", "its the UN".
When basically good people are confronted with pure evil, the temptation is to pick a simple answer and run with it. But the tragedy in Rwanda was not the "fault" of the UN, or Bill Clinton and the US, or ex-colonialist Europe, or the African leadership and military. Some combination of these actors, and the rotting African economic and governmental system has led to failed states and economies like Rwanda's, from Angola to Zimbabwe, over the last 50 years. Making analysis even more complicated, the cycle of aid, corruption, and dependence that a generous world has created to try and "solve" poverty and hunger in Africa has, lately, also been recognized part of the problem.
The Rwandan genocide was a symptom of a complex and insidious disease, not the disease itself.
.
This complexity makes it harder to answer "why", harder to say "that's horrible" and "go back to our dinners" as one American journalist points out in the movie. But responding with guilt or blind anger and accusations does no one any good. The answers are somewhere in between.
The least we can do is try, very hard, to understand.
posted by paul at 4:31 PM
9 Comments:
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I have seen Hotel Rwanda and had mixed feelings. Certain aspects are very good, but I concur that the movie is a mediocre rendition of an incredible story that pulls its punches. Again, you are correct that Cheadle carries the movie and carries it well. He made the transition of the character believable. If only the movie could have aspired to "the killing fields" which dealt with the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia. If you have not seen that movie I would strongly suggest you do.
Oz,
I have not seen the Killing Fields, but know the story and thought of it while I watched HR.
I will rent it on your recommendation.
Thanks for stopping by.
I thought Hotel Rwanda was a little unfair. I may be wrong but as and Afrian I feel terrible when Africans are let off the hook for injustices they committ. The genocide was a carefully planned and well ochestrated operation, that is why is "the most efficient genocide"... The movie down played this greatly as if saying, "that is what you expect from a retard, you are the sane one America, it is your fault anything that happens to your retarted brother...". Stron words, but I think the movie should have depicted more of where the blame lies. It is like someone making a film about the concentration camps, and then letting Hilter off the hook and blaming a third party squarely in their movie...
Where are you From? Pray do tell...
East coast USA.
Also, prior comment much appreciated. The perspective of Africans on almost every one of these issues seems to be swept aside by everyone in the west. And you make a great point about the nature of responsibility.
I thought the movie had an odd approach to the genocide, almost as if it were secondary to the story, not the story itself.
Thanks again for your comments, I am very glad you had a chance to read. I would love to hear more feedback on some of these posts from your friends. I feel like I am shooting in the dark, but maybe aiming in the right direction.
Nice post thanks for shairng, I agree with you, when the war of world 2 finished, the age of internet war starts, the research about this starts in middle of 70s if my memory don't fail and until now the world have been submited in dark times, but after that during the war of world 2 many people tryed to scape from the war letting pas to another people do whatever they want.
Thanks for sharing.
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Hi again, I have hear some creepy stories about this place, I read that a man kills her daughter in this place but as soon he killed her, her spirit came back looking for revenge.
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