"The funny thing about genocide, you never know who's knocking."
That chilling voiceover just past the opening credits sets the
tone for Kinyarwanda, a moving series of vignettes revisiting
the 1994 Rwandan Civil War from the inside out. The movie marks
the brilliant directorial debut of recent NYU film school grad
Alrick Brown, whose emotionally-engaging ensemble drama made
quite a splash at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year
where it won the Audience Award in the World Cinema category.
Employing a cinematic technique effectively employed in Crash,
the picture revisits the genocide in Rwanda from the
perspectives of individuals hopelessly immersed in the conflict.
The net result is an absorbing adventure which forces the
audience to invest emotionally in the diverging fates of a
variety of complex characters as opposed to the narrowly-drawn,
one-dimensional characters usually served up in war flicks.
What was it probably like to live in a country where, for three
months, members of two contentious tribes, the Hutus and Tutsis,
hacked each other to death in hand-to-hand combat? And how were
they finally able to bury the hatchet, or should I say machete,
and embrace a peace process putting the country on a path to
unity and reconciliation?
These are the sort of questions Kinyarwanda eloquently addresses
not by depicting mob scenes of senseless slaughter, but rather
by painting a number of micro tableaus involving individuals
trying to survive in the wake of the collapse of civilization.
For whether you're watching an introspective army Lieutenant
(Cassandra Freeman), a spineless Catholic priest (Mazimpaka
Kennedy), an empathetic, Muslim mullah (Mutsari Jean), a
coldblooded guerilla leader (Edouard Bamporiki), an innocent,
little boy (Hasasan Kabera), or a teenager (Marc Gwamaka) with a
crush on a cute girl (Hadidja Zaninka) from the proverbial wrong
side of the tracks, you have an opportunity to bear witness in
intimate fashion to everyday situations similar to what very
likely really unfolded.
Based on actual events, it was quite surprising to this critic
to learn the role that Islam played in the cessation of
hostilities once the mufti ordered that all the nation's mosques
serve as safe havens for refugees, regardless of ethnicity.
Congrats to Alrick Brown for making the most of a micro-budget
and for coaxing great performances out of a cast comprised
mostly of unprofessional, Rwandan actors touched by the tragedy.
An inspirational, modern morality play apt to restore your faith
in humanity.
Kinyarwanda
[2011]