hotel rwanda
In just one hundred days, almost one million people were murdered in the genocide rampage that swept through Rwanda, Africa in 1994. Hotel Rwanda, a film directed by Terry George in 2004, is a story based on the tragedy that occurred ten years prior. The massacre is a result of the Hutu tribe’s prejudice and discrimination of the Tutsi tribe and the world’s lack of intervention. George’s depiction of the event is less about the massacre itself though because of his choice to portray it from the view of Paul Rusesabagina, a Hutu hotel manager married to a Tutsi woman. Mass media hasn’t always been the way it is today. Movies are now one of the most popular forms of entertainment and one of the most efficient ways of sending a message. Terry George had that in mind when Hotel Rwanda was produced. In 1994, the murder occurring in Africa might not have gained the news coverage it should in America, and the coverage it did have might not have contained the whole truth. The message behind George’s film is just that – the truth of what happened in Africa. Hate and a superior complex got the best of the Hutu tribe, and with no one to stop them, they began to wipe out the Tutsi population. Of course not every Hutu was as evil as the rest. America may not have been affected by the uproar across the ocean, but Paul Rusesabagina was. Terry George spreads his message of truth by retelling the event with Paul’s story. Paul had a family with his Tutsi wife, Tatiana. He was not going to listen to the demeaning remarks of the Tutsi’s as “cockroaches” or let himself be swept away by their degrading actions, although he was skeptical at first to offer his help for fear losing his job. Paul is the manager of the elegant hotel in Rwanda, Hotel Des Milles Collines, which is turned in a sort of refugee camp for over one thousand Tutsi’s. Through many connections he made through his job, Paul narrowly saves the people from death more than once by calling upon favors from various