Genocide

As We Forgive (2008)

Could you forgive a person who murdered your family? This is the question faced by the subjects of As We Forgive, a documentary about Rosaria and Chantal-two Rwandan women coming face-to-face with the men who slaughtered their families during the 1994 genocide. The subjects of As We Forgive speak for a nation still wracked by the grief of a genocide that killed one in eight Rwandans in 1994. Overwhelmed by an enormous backlog of court cases, the government has returned over 50,000 thousand genocide perpetrators back to the very communities they helped to destroy. Without the hope of full justice, Rwanda has turned to a new solution: Reconciliation. But can it be done? Can survivors truly forgive the killers who destroyed their families? Can the government expect this from its people? And can the church, which failed at moral leadership during the genocide, fit into the process of reconciliation today?

Director: Laura Waters Hinson 
Beyond Right and Wrong (2012)

"Beyond Right & Wrong" looks at areas of conflict around the world and asks what it takes to forgive, and what it takes to ask for forgiveness under the most difficult of circumstances. Paired personal interviews of aggressors and victims from Northern Ireland, Rwanda, Israel, and Palestine, BEYOND RIGHT AND WRONG examines anger, understanding, remorse, tolerance, and sometimes clemency. The survivors' stories are haunting and inspiring, and the film is a meditation on justice and its role in national and personal healing.

Directors: Lekha Singh, Roger Spottiswoode


Darfur (2009)


American journalists in Sudan are confronted with the dilemma of whether to return home to report on the atrocities they have seen, or to stay behind and help some of the victims they have encountered.

Director: Uwe Boll
Earth Made of Glass (2010)

On August 6th, 2008, against the backdrop of the world's deadliest war in neighboring Eastern Congo, Rwandan President Paul Kagame issued a report detailing the French government's hidden role in the 1994 Rwandan genocide. Three months later, his closest aide, Rose Kabuye is arrested by France on charges of terrorism. Meanwhile, Jean-Pierre Sagahutu, a genocide survivor haunted by his father's unsolved murder, scours the Rwandan countryside on a fifteen-year-search for clues - ultimately finding himself confronted with his darkest desire: being face-to-face with his father's killer. As President Kagame fights to free Rose from France and finally expose the shocking truth about what truly happened in Rwanda fifteen years ago, Jean-Pierre journeys to the scene of the crime, and the doorstep of a killer, to uncover the chilling facts behind his father's death. As each relentlessly pursues the truth they find themselves faced with a choice: to take revenge or turn the other cheek... Despite having never met, the story of a President and an ordinary citizen become inextricably linked in this groundbreaking film.

Director: Deborah Scranton
Gacaca, Living Together Again in Rwanda? (2002)

Rwanda's Gacaca courts have become a model for a peaceful society. 15 years after the genocide and with thousands of culprits sentenced by the courts, is Rwanda ready to surmount its tragic history? 
At a Gacaca court in Southern Rwanda, a women accuses a man of "killing my husband and nephews!" Yet the main witness defends the accused: "I didn't see him until we came to Kabuga". The witness has been imprisoned for genocide killings himself but after repenting, he was granted early release. As a minority, the Tutsis knew they had to create a justice system, revolving around reconciliation. The gacaca courts have proved to be the answer: "We feel we should run faster, and get this country to greater heights" says the chief of police, "there is quite a lot we missed during the genocide".

Director: Anne Aghion


Hotel Rwanda (2004)

The true story of Paul Rusesabagina, a hotel manager who housed over a thousand Tutsi refugees during their struggle against the Hutu militia in Rwanda.

Director: Terry George

In Rwanda We Say... The Family That Does Not Speak Dies (2004)

Set in Rwanda, the director interviews a genocide offender who has been released back into his community, and  the victims of genocide. 


Director: Anne Aghion


Kinyarwanda (2011) 

A young Tutsi woman and a young Hutu man fall in love amidst chaos; a soldier struggles to foster a greater good while absent from her family; and a priest grapples with his faith in the face of unspeakable horror.

Director: Alrick Brown 
Muyurangabo (2007)

From opposing ethnic groups, Ngabo and Sangwa are tested when old-timers warn, "Hutus and Tutsis should not be friends." An intense & inspiring portrait of youth in Rwanda, MUNYURANGABO features Poet Laureate Edouard Uwayo delivering a moving poem about his healing country. Rwanda. Kinyarwanda w/ English subtitles. Winner - AFI FF; Official Selection - Cannes, Berlin and Toronto FFs.

Director: Lee Isaac Chung


Shake Hands with the Devil (2007)

The story of General Romeo Dallaire's frustrated efforts to stop the madness of the Rwandan Genocide, despite the complete indifference of his superiors.

Director: Roger Spottiswood
Shooting Dogs (2005)

In April 1994, after the airplane of the Hutu President of Rwanda is shot down, the Hutu militias slaughter the Tutsi population. In the Ecole Technique Officielle, the Catholic priest Christopher and the idealistic English teacher Joe Connor lodge two thousand and five hundred Rwandans refugees, under the protection of the Belgian UN force and under siege by Hutu militia. When the Tutsi refugees are abandoned by the UN, they are murdered by the extremist militia.

Director: Michael Caton-Jones


Sometimes in April (2005)

Debra Winger, Oris Erhuero and Idris Elba star in this drama framed by the Rwandan genocide.

Director: Raoul Peck 


Sweet Dreams (2012)

A remarkable group of Rwandan women defies the devastation of the genocide to form the country's first all-female drumming troupe and open the country's first ice cream shop.

Directors: Lisa Fruchtman, Rob Fruchtman


The Day God Walked Away (2009)

Film offers a new take on the Rwandan genocide, through the first person experience of one woman as the horror descends.

Director: Philippe Van Leeuw


The look of silence (2015)

A follow-up to "The Act of Killing," "The Look of Silence" follows the life of a family in Indonesia, grappling with the death of their son during the 1965 genocide. The documentary focuses specifically on the family's youngest son, who -- as an optometrist -- attempts to speak to the perpetrators of genocide while trying to test their eyesight. 


Directed by Joshua Oppenheimer.


The Flute Player (2003)

A refugee returns to Cambodia, where he has launched a master musician project to revive the traditional music that disappeared under the Khmer Rouge.

Director: Jocelyn Glatzer 
The Last Just Man (2002)

First-person interviews and graphic footage punctuate Steven Silver's documentary about the shocking events surrounding the 1994 Rwandan massacres. UN Peacekeeping Mission Brigadier General Romeo Dallair was sent to Rwanda to keep the peace, but his call for help would ultimately go unheeded. As the violence continued to escalate, General Dallair realized he would have to face the struggle alone. Could the massacre of 800,000 men, women, and children have been prevented, as General Dallair claims to this very day? The only way to prevent such tragedies in the future is to learn from the mistakes of our past. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi


Director: Steven Silver 
100 Days (2001)

A local Hutu official is persuaded to implement the government's policy against the Tutsi : To completly wipe them out. Josette, a beautiful young Tutsi girl struggles to survive the killing by taking refugee in a church, supposedly protected by the UNO forces. Meanwhile, Josette's brother is hunted down and murdered and her boyfriend rescued by rhe rebels. But the Hutu Catholic priest betrays Josette's family and only agrees to spare her life is the submits to the nightly violations. By the time she is reunited with her boyfriend, neither of them can face the brutal reality of their situation : she is pregnant and bears the priest's child, which she immediatly abandons.

Director: Nick Hughes