- CONTRIBUTED
Don Cheadle (right), Sophie Okonedo (centre) and Antonion David Lyons (left) star as Paul, Tatiana and Thomas in 'Hotel Rwanda'.
Tanya Batson-Savage, Freelance Writer
TWO VISIONS of one of humanity's great horrors have recently unfolded on film and it's something of a re-run. In 1994 the world watched silently as thousands of Rwandans were slaughtered. In 2005 we get to watch it again, this time with a choice of a big-screen event or from the intimacy of our bedrooms or living rooms.
Hotel Rwanda and Sometimes in April are both films about the genocide in Rwanda, when in 1994 extremist Hutus slaughtered Tutsis and many other Hutus. So, being children of the same tragedy, the two films are brothers of a sort. Though they both provide haunting representation of the inhumanity of humans, they come from very different visions.
Both shows are well-written, beautifully directed, contain laudable performances and are of artistic and historic merit. Hotel Rwanda is led by a magnificent Don Cheadle, while Idris Elba (fresh from playing a gangster on The Wire) leads Sometimes in April.
HBO's Sometimes in April is written and directed by Raoul Peck, who is known for creating works with great political thrust, with the likes of Lumumba and The Man on the Shore. Peck's intense political urgings bleed forth from Sometimes in April, as it meanders between the April 2004 and April 1994. In the HBO's The Making of Sometimes in April, Peck points out that he had no interest in making a black Schindler's List, which some regard Hotel Rwanda to be.
CLEAR VISION
His political vision is clear; Peck points out that the rest of the world did nothing to help Rwanda and so all are in part culpable for what happened. Toward the end of the last reel, as the film wraps up in text, the audience is told how many of those accused of the slaughter have been found guilty. However, its last line is "of those who watched the genocide and did nothing to stop it, none have been charged". Its fingers are most decidedly pointed at those who appointed themselves guardians of the world and failed to do their job. The film employs documentary techniques and cuts into rhetoric surrounding whether it was actually genocide taking place and allows the United States and the United Nations to join forces in their deadly disinterest.
Hotel Rwanda, directed by Terry George does not swagger with as much political intent, but it is no less poignant. George, who has directed A Bright Shining Lie and Some Mother's Son, brings a more human interest approach to his politics. Thus Hotel Rwanda looks at the struggles of those who stayed in the hotel Mille Colline, focusing particularly on how house manager Paul Rusesabagina engineered bravery in the face of horror.
In keeping with that, it makes its political point through the characters. So Nick Nolte and Joaquin Phoenix are allowed to illustrate western disinterest, with Nolte representing the UN and Phoenix the US. Hotel Rwanda makes it clear that both men are interested in ending the tragedy; it is the institutions that govern them that keep them impotent.
Whichever one you see - and hopefully you see both - there is much to be gained from these films. They are joined in a riveting conversation about the slaughter and how it unfolded. Both films highlight that the labels Tutsi and Hutu were originally created by the colonial rulers and the genocide was spurred by the hatred engendered under colonial rule. It is at moments like this that both films best complement each other. Where Hotel Rwanda makes reference to the method of selection for who makes a Hutu or a Tutsi, Sometimes in April shows how it was done, presenting that mind-boggling notion of measuring someone's nose to determine their ethnicity.
Of course, such artificial naming was not limited to Rwandans. Theirs simply had a more intensely bloody result. In our society we can still see the effects of colonisation in the self-mutilation brought about by 'bleachin'. It makes itself present when at a movie in 2005 one can hear reference to "nutten too black nuh good".
The post-colonial world continues to reel from the blows of history and our self-inflicted injuries only hamper the recovery. When the old world drew back from their conquered lands, they often left behind systems built on hate and violence. The result has been the creation of much of the Third World and woe be on to those who have neither oil nor diamonds to grease the wheels of aid when their right to life is threatened.
This was the fate of Rwanda.
VALUE OF NAMES
Both films also highlight the value of names. By using the term cockroach, the killers never have to think of those they slaughter as human. Who thinks about an insect when they exterminate it? Words like horrific fail to accurately capture the slaughter that both movies detail, though neither of them revel in it, which seems to make it worse.
There are also several moments which echo in both films: the use of radio broadcasts to steer the killings, the role of the Mille Colline and a spirit of survival in dire situations.
Because Sometimes in April moves between 2004 and 1994, it makes it clear that Rwanda is still a country in recovery. With Hotel Rwanda, it is easier to believe that it is in the past, that a mere ten years was a long time ago.
And while we watch with the appropriate sense of horror, Darfur awaits...
