Just hand the Oscar over to Don Cheadle... go ahead... do it

Rating: 10/10 (29 January 2005)

Ever since seeing a program on television about the circumstances of the Rwandan genocide, I have become somewhat of a student of the issue. And sure, the Interahamwe didn't kill as many people as the Nazis, or even Pol Pot, but the brutality of slaughtering nearly a million people, most by machete, more than makes up for the numbers. And the abandonment, the sheer disregard for anything African that the West perpetrated on Rwanda, that should make all of us ashamed of our governments.
You should see this movie. Everyone should see this movie. Exquisite performances by Don Cheadle and Sophie Okonedo bring to life the desperation of simply holding on to life with the proverbial barbarians at the gate (right at the gate, as it was), and all while Cheadle's Rusesabagina clings tenaciously to the image and prestige of his hotel, giving his best when everything else falls apart. How the real life Paukl managed to keep it all together, bribe the army, keep the militia at bay is nothing short of a miracle, and the cast brings that to you in such sharp detail that you can't feel anything but the utmost admiration and astonishment for everyone who kept it together.
Rusesabagina, General Dallaire, and many others are the true measure of hero. They gave everything they had to make sure that 800,000 didn't turn into millions.