Reflection on 'Hotel Rwanda'

The movie portrayed the brutality and the reality of 1994 genocide in Rwanda. Its intention is to inform the heartbreaking history of Rwanda and to make a difference to today’s world. It approached the audience in an emotional way so they would naturally acknowledge the genocide. I believe that ‘Hotel Rwanda’ have successfully achieved its purpose. I never knew that there was genocide in Rwanda until I saw this movie. Vivid images and striking conversations really touched upon the hearts of everyone. Images and words in this movie have given inerasable memories to the audience. Tens of thousands of corpse lying on the ground was an image that struck me the most. When Paul began to cry, it made me cry and let me understand his situation of the burdens and responsibilities. The conversation between the UN general and Paul caused sympathy and heartaching at the same time. I imagine what the consequence will be, if United Nation and other countries came and stopped the genocide. The genocide would not have lasted for three months and many innocent lives would have been saved. This movie shows and criticizes United Nation and countries who had the responsibilities to help Rwanda.

The Genocide in Rwanda

Genocide in 1994 lasted for three months and caused 800,000 living deaths of Rwandans. The incident in Rwanda was ignored by the whole world but it no longer could disappear in history. As time went by, the number of deaths increased, and the situation became worse. The strong countries, which are supposed to prevent, rather avoided and brought back their soldiers to their country. Even United Nation did not do their best to help Rwanda’s situation. Media has a large influence to the people and the world. Other countries would not have known the genocide if it was not for the media. The media expresses how severe and devastating the genocide it was and the countries had the opportunities to be aware of it. I thought about the question “The responsibility to protect.” “We argued that the primary responsibility for that protection lies with the sovereign state. But if that state is unable or unwilling to protect its population, or is itself the cause of the threat, the responsibility to protect those people shifts to the international community of states.” I agree with the author because if the sovereign country can not handle, the other countries should help. We are in the twenty-first century where the world became closer and the boundaries have weakened. We help and care one another and acknowledge the fact that each individual is important. Nevertheless if we be an ignorant and an egoist, then we did not learn anything from the sacrifice of deaths in history.


http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/ghosts/etc/cron.html
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/ghosts/etc/protect.html