Hotel Rwanda Release Date: December 22, 2004 Starring: Don Cheadle, Djimon Hounsou, Nick Nolte, Joaquin Phoenix Directed by: Terry George GLENN KENNY'S REVIEW (posted 12/22/04)
It sounds like an oxymoron to characterize a picture as a non-preachy message film, but director and cowriter Terry George is as deft with his storytelling as he is laser-focused with his social conscience, and he, aided by a terrific cast fronted by the great Don Cheadle, does yeomanly work here, with a film that both illuminates the tragedy of the Rwandan genocide in the ’90s and celebrates a real-life hero who put his life on the line to save others. Cheadle plays a Rwandan Hutu running a swank Belgian-owned hotel when the massacring of the Tutsis begins. Stunned by the worldwide indifference to this madness, he makes the hotel a haven for Tutsi families. By turns harrowing and stirring, it’s a shame-inducing history lesson that never feels like a lecture.
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