Has a Schindler's List feel, but trust me - it's better

Rating: 8/10 (16 May 2005)

The premise for Hotel Rwanda seems much like that of Schindler's List, released a decade before it... the story of one man who uses his power and position to provide a haven for refugees from a brutal war where they are the targets. I'll be blunt; Schindler's List underwhelmed me and I felt like I was being forced to feel emotions that just wouldn't generate themselves.
Hotel Rwanda succeeds where Spielberg's self-proclaimed classic failed. Lead character Paul (Don Cheadle) shelters men, women and children from both sides of Rwanda's bloody civil war. You don't go into this film with any preconceived 'Jews good, Nazis bad' notion of whether it is the Hutu or the Tutsi people who are being demonised. It is the atrocities of the war itself that are painted in a deserving light and the producers let the film focus on Paul's struggle to save the lives of those in his care.
The film is brutally honest about the horrors of war without the melodrama that might bely a lesser production. The images speak for themselves; there is no need for over-blown orchestral melodies in the background trying to forcibly yank the tears from our eyes. It's a straight-up, believable film.
The entire cast nail their parts to perfection, especially Cheadle who comes into his own playing an unlikely hero, sometimes skittish and unsure of himself, only once having to display any kind of bravado, and even then only when it is necessary that his people's lives will be spared.
Hotel Rwanda is a brilliant, moving and most of all realistic film that lets the true story on which it is based tell itself, without having to 'Hollywood it up' and thereby ruin the picture. A must see for all ages.