| Overall Grade: |
A- |
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| Story: |
A |
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| Acting: |
A- |
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| Direction: |
A- |
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| Visuals: |
A- |
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The Trouble with Genocide
by Blankenstein (movies profile)
Jun 25, 2005
10
of
11 people found this review helpful
A ten minute plunge into this real-life horror film will start prompting predictable
"Schindler's List" comparisons, yet this Terry George (of underrated "The Boxer") film has as much in common with that other modern epic about mass slaughter, "The Killing Fields."
It's Don Cheadle's overdue breakout role; displaying subtle intensity in feverishly suppressed anguish, he plays a Kafkaesque hotel manager who can't quite comprehend the growing insanity around him, who can't escape into any guns and ammo superhero response, who can only stay one tiny step ahead of a monster mob -- a mob armed mainly with hatchets and machettes -- and eerie radio messages that order the killings.
The real history behind this modern tragedy is a bit glossed over (for example, the fatally indecisive President Clinton only appears for a nanosecond on a Time magazine cover and the murdering of the Belgium UN soldiers happens quickly off-screen). At the risk of sounding horribly morbid, the film actually could have shown even more of the grim helplessness, yet there is little to slow both the sinking sadness and the constant terror of feeling how a neighboring army of former neighbors could turn into a genocidal machine.
Nick Notle's gravel throated foil at times slips into one of his several other notably similar characters, but the movie thankfully avoids shifting into the viewpoint of the guilty white liberal trying to save the less able black victims (like the atrocious "Mississippi Burning"). The filmmakers probably know a white lead or two could have meant more ticket sales, but their refusal to surrender to the Hollywood marketplace pays off by the film's end, whether you are wiping a tear or just stumbling out the nearest exit. |
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