Product Details

• Actors: Don Cheadle, Sophie Okonedo, Joaquin Phoenix, Xolani Mali, Desmond Dube
• Directors: Terry George
• Writers: Terry George, Keir Pearson
• Producers: A. Kitman Ho, Bridget Pickering, Duncan Reid, Francesco Melzi d'Eril, Hal Sadoff
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC
• Language: English, French
• Rated: R (Restricted)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Fox Home Entertainme
• VHS Release Date: April 12, 2005
• Run Time: 121 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (342 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B0007R4TRQ
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #168,423 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Solidly built around a subtle yet commanding performance by Don Cheadle, Hotel Rwanda emerged as one of the most highly-praised dramas of 2004. In a role that demands his quietly riveting presence in nearly every scene, Cheadle plays real-life hero Paul Rusesabagina, a hotel manager in the Rwandan capital of Kigali who in 1994 saved 1,200 Rwandan "guests" from certain death during the genocidal clash between tribal Hutus, who slaughtered a million victims, and the horrified Tutsis, who found safe haven or died. Giving his best performance since his breakthrough role in Devil in a Blue Dress, Cheadle plays Rusesabagina as he really was during the ensuing chaos: "an expert in situational ethics" (as described by critic Roger Ebert), doing what he morally had to do, at great risk and potential sacrifice, with an understanding that wartime negotiations are largely a game of subterfuge, cooperation, and clever bribery. Aided by a United Nations official (Nick Nolte), he worked a saintly miracle, and director Terry George (Some Mother's Son) brings formidable social conscience to bear on a true story you won't soon forget. --Jeff Shannon

Product Description

Once you find out what happened in Rwanda, you'll never forget. Oscar(r) nominee* Don Cheadle (Traffic) gives "the performance of his career in this extraordinarily powerful" (The Hollywood Reporter) and moving true story of one man's brave stance against savagery during the 1994 Rwandan conflict. Sophie Okonedo (Dirty Pretty Things) co-stars as the loving wife who challenges a good man to become a great man. As his country descends into madness, five-star-hotel manager Paul Rusesabagina (Cheadle) sets out to save his family. But when he sees that theworld will not intervene in the massacre of minority Tutsis, he finds the courage to open his hotelto more than 1,200 refugees. Now, with a rabid militia at the gates, he must use his well-honed grace, flattery and cunning to protect his guests from certain death. *2004: Actor, Hotel Rwanda

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

149 of 161 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A memorable performance in an unforgettable horror story, April 17, 2005

By 

Lawrance M. Bernabo (The Zenith City, Duluth, Minnesota) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Hotel Rwanda (DVD)

In 1994 when Rwanda descended into the bloody madness of genocide Paul Ruseasabagina (Don Cheadle) was reasonably secure in his process. He belonged to the Hutu majority that was slaughtering the minority with machetes and he was the manger of the five-star Hotel Milles Collines in Kigali. But his wife, Tatiana (Sophie Okonedo), is Tutsi and the Tutsi are not only being called "cockroaches" on the nonstop incendiary radio broadcasts they are being exterminated like them. Not only are his wife and children in danger, so is the rest of his family and so are the guests in his hotel. It is up to Ruseasabagina to do something about this madness simply because there is nobody else to do the job (it would be easier to call the character Paul, but given the story it seems important to focus on the fact he was an African).

"Hotel Rwanda" is a true story, and even though we know going in that Ruseasabagina is going to save over a thousand refugees this is still a harrowing story. For the most part the genocide happens outside the walls of the hotel, but there are enough scenes and stories of what is happening to make it clear that the people huddled in the hotel are in mortal danger. What is probably the most unforgettable moment comes while a van is being driven through the fog and appears to have gone off the road (the DVD extras also contain scenes of the unforgettable way the Tutsi have memorialized the victims of the slaughter at one location).

The explanation for why the United Nations, the Europeans, the Americans, or anybody else with a speck of humanity in them does not intervene to stop the genocide is articulated by the Colonel Oliver character played by Nick Nolte, who tells Ruseasabagina that the problem is that these are just black Africans killing other black Africans. The words are spoken in disgust and are brutal, but they are horribly true and what redeems Oliver is not only that is he is willing to articulate the brutal truth but that there will come a point where orders to stand by and do nothing are no longer going to be obeyed. Likewise, the cameraman played by Joaquin Phoenix provides a memorable scene as the Europeans leave the Milles Collines and the character is so shamed not only by the retreat but also by the presence of a hotel employee holding an umbrella over their heads in the pouring rain.

But there is one person who cannot turn his back on what is happening. Ruseasabagina is literally the right person in the right place, because only the hotel could have become a refuge for the Tutsi and only the manager of a five-star hotel could have known exactly how to placate the military men leading the massacre. Not only does he speak their language, there is a sense in which they want to speak his as well, showing that even though their arms are covered in blood they can play the role of a civilized man. Cheadle's performance, deservedly nominated for a Best Actor Oscar, is appropriately controlled just as Ruseasabagina had to be in persuading these thugs to help him. He cracks only once when a mundane part of his preparing for his job suddenly becomes an impossibility to manage. He is also a hero who is flawed, making mistakes and trying desperately to do the right thing, even if that means forcing his wife to make a fateful promise or abandoning his family to try and save others.

There is an obvious comparison to be made between "Hotel Rwanda" and "Schindler's List." But watching this 2004 film I could not help thinking that if during the Holocaust there had been images of Nazis herding Jews into the concentration camps on the nightly news nobody would have done anything either (but if a whale is trapped in an ice flow in the arctic a rescue mission shall be sent). Stories such as this emphasize the small number doing good against the large number doing evil, but there is always that even larger number signifying all the people who do nothing and assent to the evil by their silence. Those who watch "Hotel Rwanda" will find themselves counted among that final number and should well remember that even if they were oblivious to what happened in Rwanda history will repeat itself is this regard and give us another chance to do the right thing.

156 of 179 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Powerful and Moving, January 11, 2005

By 

R. J. Marsella (California) - See all my reviews
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This is a movie that is unforgettable in it's accurate portrayal of human brutality. It is an ugly indictment of the West's refusal to intervene in a crisis that allowed unspeakable slaughter to occur. The film is incredibly well written, well acted and the scenes are frighteningly realistic. Don Cheadle is superb as the heroic hotel manager who more than rises to the occassion using his wits to keep his family and hundreds of others safe in the midst of chaos. He surely deserves great recognition for this role.

Rwanda is a lesson in how Governments and the media can selectively focus on problem areas in the world and also can selectively ignore others. For example most Americans now know differences between shiites and sunnis and kurds but how many know the differences between tsuties and hutus ? That fact that the hatred portrayed in this film is so irrational combined with the look the other way attitude of much of the west contibutes to an astoundingly shameful episode of recent history. The film does much to illuminate and educate.

25 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Too powerful to be described by mere words, May 23, 2005

By 

Amanda Richards (Georgetown, Guyana) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Hotel Rwanda (DVD)

"The Kite Runner" may be the best book I have read in recent history, and without a doubt, "Hotel Rwanda" wins the corresponding prize for movies. Unable to believe the senseless violence and slaughter of innocents, my eyes opened wider and wider as the movie progressed, until at some point, the tears could not be held back any longer.

Don Cheadle aces a career making role as Paul Rusesabagina, the quiet, understated hotel manager of a five star hotel in Kigali, Rwanda, who breaks every rule in the management book to protect not only the hotel guests, but refugees from both sides of the genocide that rocked Rwanda in 1994, while the rest of the world looked the other way.

A Hutu by birth and passport stamp, Paul is married to a Tutsi woman (Sophie Okonedo, whose voice changes drastically in octave as the role demands), and by this distinction, his children are also Tutsi, and therefore branded as cockroaches to be exterminated.

Because of his position and well-placed contacts, Rusesabagina is able to cling tenuously to his little safe house, putting up a brave front for the 1200 people he is sheltering from the Hutu tribal forces. When he finds out that the UN peacekeepers cannot help them, and that the rest of the world doesn't want to know about African problems, he resorts to the local language, securing protection by whatever means necessary from the authorities, led by General Bizimungu, who has a weakness for Scottish water of life, foreign currency and self preservation. Being only human, and in a crisis situation, he makes crucial errors in judgment, but by his conviction he manages to hold it all together for as long as necessary.

There are too many powerful scenes to describe, and you have to watch the movie to fully appreciate the horror. There are no gory images as in "Saving Private Ryan" or "Blade", but the Director manages to effectively portray the despair and mass killings without being offensively graphic or crude. One of the most heart rending scenes takes place on a road in the early morning fog, and this is the final straw that rips through Rusesabagina's brittle façade of being in control.

Joaquin Phoenix (you know I have to mention him), in a small role as a cameraman sums it up best when he said "I've never been so ashamed."

This one is a must see.

Amanda Richards, May 23, 2005