Tonight's my birthday. I'll celebrate it with my family first, and with you second. I present to you the best movie I've ever seen. I cried,laughed and felt every scene in the movie. Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you Hôtel Rwanda.
PS:The movie is based on real events that occurred in 1994, Rwanda. It's carved in mankind's history as : 100 days of murder.
History
1916, Rwanda was handed to belgium after the collapsing of Germany after WW1. Nearly two decades later, 1933. Belgium introduces ethnicity cards classifying the ethnic groups of Rwanda. The Hutu (~85% of the country's population), The Tutsi (~15%) and the Twa (~1%) Based on the colonizer's ideology of conquer and divide, Belgians began creating a narrative in which the Tutsi are elite rulers while the Hutu are farmers and underclass workers.
PS:When Belgians began dividing the country, they used extreme mesures to really devide people. Even tho you can't basically tell if someone is a Tutsi or a Hutu by eye, Belgium found a way...
By 1959, most colonial powers began leaving Africa, including Belgium. That's when years of ethnic division gave it's fruits
and a Hutu revolution was to be. Thousands of Tutsi murdered, most have fled to neighbor countries. This lasted until 1962 when Rwanda had its independence with a Hutu government.
Came 1990, the exiled Tutsi formed what is known as the RPF (Rwandan Patriotic Front). Civil war erupts and northern Rwanda is taken by the RPF.
1993.This is when everything begins. The Hutu president signed the Arusha Accords, a peace treaty with the RPF. On the other hand a Hutu extremists group called the interhamwe opposes this considering it weakness.
This same militia started what would be called later the darkest radio station in world history : RTLM (Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines) .
6 April 1994, the president's plane is shut down over the capital Kigali. The Genocide begins.
Story
PS:Not only the movie's historical events are real but our protagonist's story too is real and occured at the time. The international hero: Paul Rusesabagina
The movie embodies the story of Paul Rusesabagina a hotel manager in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda. While Paul lives a well connected peaceful life, the Rwandan Genocide disturbs it all. Between his wife's love and his work duty, who shall he save?
Paul Rusesabagina
To understand how Paul thinks, we have to look at what his wife told him when Tutsi neighbor's came to him.
Paul:Why do the neighbors run to us?We understand that Paul is a really kind man, at first you may think they are just words, but when he is put to choice between fleeing the country with his family and leaving the hotel full of refugies behind or to stay and help them. Paul does the latter. He is fully prepared to sacrifice himself for peace. Peace not only for his family but for humans everywhere, if paul were to be in any country he would have done the same.
Tatiana:You are the only Hutu they can trust.
The second thing we understand about our protagonist is that he is not just a manager by job, he is one by heart. Even when the foreigners including the Hotel Milles Colines real manager leaves, Paul still maintains order in staff and in guests.
Paul's personality shifts when he understands that his whole life, he's been stacking up favors of foreign powerful people, only for them to abandon him the second the intervention forces come to get them out. You know why he didn't leave with his family in the truck? because he knows how those refugees will feel, he's been there.
After coming from Georges Rutaganda's place, Paul closes the door on himself and began changing his suit, at that moment he collapses and starts crying. No one can stay well minded amidst all this.
I wish they were more Paul Rusesabagina in the world, I will at least try to be one.
Paul:I cannot leave these people to die
Tatiana
I don't know if it's love or insanity, but Tatiana . She is a Tutsi, she tells paul to take the children and run away. In other words, she sacrificies herself for her family. Amidst all the war, Paul takes Tatiana to the hotel's roof for a last romantic supper. It resembles love inside warzones,genocides around the globe. She promised him if the Interahamwe gets to them, she will kill herself and the kids. She didn't. Lastly, I wanna applaud the actor Sophie Okonedo for the marvelous role she did.
United Nations
While the UN is supposed to help countries around the world, when the Rwandan Genocide occurs, instead of increasing the fire power of UN officers, they reduced it by more than half. Even when Europe send an " intervention" force, it comes only to rescue their citizens. Colonel Olivier is a UN officer in the movie. After the intervention force announce that they are going to extract only europeans. He can't even look paul in the eyes, he explains that for Europe, Africa is just a trash can. We know he has a morals, aside from that we know he saves lives not because he is UN, because he is human. You can see it in him.
Conclusion
To everyone who watches this movies, this is no ordinary one. It's a piece of art, it tells a story, that millions lived and still live to this day. Even tho paul's adventure has a happy ending, many didn't. The only message I want the world to know is to be kind, be gentle, be human.