Dir. Terry George, 2004, South Africa, 121 mins
Cast:
Don Cheadle, Sophie Okonedo, Nick Nolte, Joaquin Pheonix
At the heart of stories like Steven Spielberg's Schindler's List or this year's Oscar-nominated Hotel Rwanda lies the same fundamental question: How does a single individual manage to make a difference and save lives in the face of institutionalised mass murder and destruction, when all the social agents that could be expected to protect human life and safety (police, army, judiciary) have been subverted or turned into a part of the killing machine? How can such a person cling to a sense of decency and humanity when all justice seems to have vanished and to speak out for the victims is to risk becoming one? When soul-destroying horror has become the only constant of everyday life?
In the midst of one of the worst spates of mass murder and violence since the Second World War, one such individual was Paul Rusesabagina, a former theology student well advanced on a successful career as hotel manager in his native Rwanda when the events leading to the 1994 genocide began to unfold.
Rusesabagina had worked as assistant manager of the luxury Mille Colines Hotel in Kigali for nine years and had just been promoted to manager of another Sabena airlines hotel when, after a protracted civil war which had already seen mass killings of civilians, Hutu President Major General Juvenal Habyarimana was assassinated on 6 April 1994. The same Hutu extremists who had orchestrated the murder now unleashed the Hutu-dominated army and the Interahamwe militia on the Tutsi minority, whom they publicly blamed for Habyarimana's death. In the following three months, and while the international community stood by and did little, one million Tutsis and moderate Hutus were massacred.
Thanks to Rusesabagina's bravery and initiative, the Mille Colines hotel, to which he had returned after the killings began, soon became one of a handful of relatively safe havens in the whole of the country. Incessantly working the hotel's only remaining phone line, keeping in constant touch with his Sabena superiors and Western governments and media, Rusesabagina turned the Mille Colines into an international cause celebre as one of the few available ways of protecting the hundreds of Rwandans who had taken refuge there. Averting crisis after crisis, Rusesabagina bribed, cajoled and persuaded high dignataries, Rwandan soldiers and Interahamwe militiamen to keep the killers away. By the end of the genocide, over 1,200 Rwandans who had taken shelter at the Mille Colines hotel owed Rusesabagina their lives.
Paul Rusesabagina himself has been associated with Terry George's Hotel Rwanda ever since George and co-writer Keir Pearson first interviewed him in 2002. George has spoken eloquently about his admiration for Rusesabagina and the huge responsibility that was trying to do justice to the 1994 events. Protagonists Don Cheadle and Sophie Okonedo, who were immediately eager to take part in the project, have expressed similar feelings and in fact Cheadle has become something of a vocal campaigner for Africa, vowing to take advantage of press conferences and interviews to draw attention to the present Sudan crisis (300,000 estimated dead, 2 million displaced) and the ongoing strife in the Congo (4 million killed, 2 million displaced). The African-American actor even visited Sudan's Darfur region, the focus of the conflict, with a US Congressional Delegation in January. Paul Rusesabagina has also expressed his satisfaction that Hotel Rwanda will communicate to a wider public the truth of what his country went through, as well as the message that even in the midst of unimaginable horrors it is possible for determined individuals to help their fellow human beings. The team expect to hold the eagerly awaited first Rwandan screening of the film in the National Stadium.
Hotel Rwanda makes some debatable choices in leaving out much of the context to the killings, including the violent history of the country over the previous years, as well as nearly everything that went on outside the Mille Colines hotel during the genocide. The film would also probably have gained from more of the scenes being at the service of subtler, underlying themes as opposed to stand-alone, slightly too obvious bits of cinema. And it's intriguing that some of the most compelling aspects of Paul Rusesabagina's actions and experiences, like his long-term, constant cultivation of his contacts in the West, and his intelligent efforts to maintain the high profile of the Mille Colines Hotel, are barely touched upon.
Hotel Rwanda has been nominated for three of this year's Oscars: Best Screenplay, Best Actor and Best Supporting Actress, for outstanding performances by Don Cheadle and British actress Sophie Okonedo. The nominations go some way to highlight not just the story of Paul Rusesabagina's bravery but also a tragic episode in the recent history of Africa that the West arguably contributed to, failed to stop and largely chose to ignore.
Hotel Rwanda is not the only film made recently about the Rwandan genocide. Michael Caton-Jones's Shooting Dogs, starring John Hurt and Hugh Dandy, will also have its premiere in Rwanda's National Stadium later this spring.
Miguel Sopena
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