A very powerful and disturbing account

Rating: 9/10 (13 January 2007)

Hotel Rwanda is the true story of a real life hero, who risked everything he had, too save as many as he could; while the governments of the world that could have helped, stood by and did nothing. Obvious comparisons have been made between this and Schindler's list, and the harrowing truths in both films do stir the emotions and enlighten the blind to the real tragedies in the world, but the films and the stories within them are very different.
Just over ten years ago some of the worst atrocities in the history of mankind took place in the country of Rwanda, and yet in the media driven world in which we live; these events went almost unnoticed by the general public and were ignored by the powers that may have helped.
Even without the production quality of Schindler's list, this film still proves to be equally as powerful; so much so, that i felt ashamed that such things had really happened during my adult life, and i'm sure anyone who sees this movie will feel the same way.
Don Cheadle excellently portrays the hero, a ordinary man named Paul Rusesabagina, who offered shelter to over a thousand people at great risk to himself and his own family. Over a period of just three months; one million people were brutally murdered, and if one man managed to save over one thousand others, imagine how many could and should have been spared their terrible fate.
The story simply has to move you, even if the film itself may appear a little cheap looking, but to me it isn't, it's realistic and shocking.
9/10 Well done