Hotel Rwanda

—Overview
—Trailers, Photos
—About this Film pdf
—Spiritual Connections

From the safety of a bus of Western tourists and diplomats being evacuated from the turmoil of Rwandan genocide in 1994, a man voyeuristically snaps a photograph of the Rwandan refugees being left hopelessly behind. As one Rwandan hopes that horrific video footage of village massacres will stir the West to action, the photojournalist on assignment there gloomily predicts that viewers will say, “Isn’t that terrible!� and go back to eating dinner.

While these scenes from Hotel Rwanda are by no means the most dramatic, for those of us who view them from the comfort of our stadium cineplexes or cushy sofas, they are the most damning. Capping off the century of humanity’s greatest inhumanity against itself, the 1994 Rwandan genocide represented for the West yet another sin of omission in our global village. In 100 days in 1994, ethnic Hutus killed some 800,000 ethnic Tutsis in Rwanda – the fastest genocide in history. This genocide could have been prevented, or at least lessened, by the United Nations and the international community. But the world was indifferent – a situation that seems to be replaying itself since February 2003 in the Darfur region of western Sudan, where government-backed militias have killed tens of thousands of civilians.

Yet what makes Hotel Rwanda a great film is more than the filmmakers’ ability to capture a story ignored a decade ago by the rest of the world. Just as we can only understand the horror of genocide one death at a time, the film puts the unimaginable situation into perspective by following the personal journey of Paul Rusesabagina (Don Cheadle), an African Oscar Schindler who at great risk to himself managed to save the lives of 1,268 people.

Within a minute of our introduction to Paul, manager of the four-star Belgian-owned Hotel Des Milles Collines in Rwanda’s capital city of Kigali, we see he is someone who knows how to work the system. He successfully gets what he needs and builds up equity for a rainy day among the various power brokers operating in his country – political, military and international non-governmental organizations. But it’s not long after we hear the rumblings of distant thunder in the film and see chaos emerge that we wonder whether this dealmaker still can navigate his world when the system utterly collapses.

Paul is Hutu, part of the ethnic group that has recently come into power after decades of domination by the minority Tutsi population. As the Hutus gain control and become increasingly bellicose, Paul seeks to protect his wife, Tatiana (portrayed by Best Supporting Actress Oscar nominee Sophie Okonedo), who is Tutsi, along with his children. “Family is all that matters,� he tells them, not wanting to intervene when a neighbor is whisked away by paramilitaries in the night. But he soon finds himself saving an entire neighborhood of Tutsis, and turning his hotel into a safe haven for them without diminishing its posh image for its guests.

Filmed in South Africa, the 2-hour and 2-minute film does an excellent job of capturing the feel of Africa, especially for one who has twice been to the continent. We see the contrasts between city and village, between Africans who look to the West for their aspirations and those who are rooted in traditional African culture. Nick Nolte does a fine job portraying a U.N. peacekeeper from Canada who is frustrated by a pullback that leaves his forces with 370 people to keep the peace in a volatile situation. As the violence unfolds, we appreciate the irony in the question heard from a U.S. press conference: “How many acts of genocide does it take to make a genocide?�

Through all this, we return to the perspective of Paul Rusesabagina, the only effective peacemaker in the film, who never picks up a gun or a weapon, and never threatens another person. Yet he grows in his effectiveness, and his humanity, as he journeys from personal concern for his livelihood and his family to public concern for all in his community.

Go see Hotel Rwanda, not just because you’ll be viewing one of the best films of 2004. Go see it as an act of penance, for our collective sin of omission, as a reminder not to be indifferent.

“In a way, to be indifferent to that suffering is what makes the human being inhuman. Indifference, after all, is more dangerous than anger and hatred. ... Indifference is not a response. Indifference is not a beginning; it is an end. And, therefore, indifference is always the friend of the enemy, for it benefits the aggressor -- never his victim, whose pain is magnified when he or she feels forgotten,� said Nobel Prize-winner Elie Wiesel. “Not to respond to their plight, not to relieve their solitude by offering them a spark of hope, is to exile them from human memory. And in denying their humanity, we betray our own.�

—Overview
—Trailers, Photos
—About this Film pdf
—Spiritual Connections

Million Dollar Baby

—Overview
—Trailers, Photos
—About this Film pdf
—Spiritual Connections

When we are confronted with a bleak reality, do we continue to hope and pursue our dreams or do we give up in despair?

That question recurs in Million Dollar Baby, an outstanding new film from Clint Eastwood about boxing and more. This theme of life’s choices circles repeatedly through the lives of the film’s three principal characters, until it crescendos with a sudden twist. The climax unleashes a powerful question that is at the heart of our culture’s debate over the value of life and a life lived well.

Eastwood, who directs the film, stars as Frankie Dunn, a hard-edged pugnacious man who is owner of The Hit Pit, a boxing gym in downtown Los Angeles. Beneath the tough exterior, we see a traditionalist who has gone to Mass every day for the past 23 years and who is teaching himself Gaelic as he reads poetry.

Yet he is a man ridden with guilt and regret, another “unforgiven� Eastwood character who is harder on himself than he is on those he loves. Yet Frankie treats his parish priest like a sparring partner, engaging in theological repartees over church doctrine – even if at time his debates border on the inane. The priest proves he can dish it out as well as Frankie, a point that becomes significant in the film’s final crisis when the priest is able to offer honest and faithful advice to Frankie on a difficult moral quandary with more than simple parroting of the church’s official line.

Scrap (Morgan Freeman) provides the film’s narrative voice, much as Freeman did in The Shawshank Redemption. A former fighter who lost his eye in a bout where Frankie was the only one in his corner, Scrap now works and lives in the seedy gym, where he seems to be Frankie’s only friend. As the film begins, Frankie loses his best fighting prospect, who finds another manager because Frankie is too cautious about letting him fight for the championship.

Into this atmosphere walks Maggie Fitzgerald (Hilary Swank), a waitress in her 30s who dreams of becoming a professional boxer and wants Frankie to train her. “I don’t train girlies,� says Frankie, telling her she is too old to reach her dream in life. But for Maggie, there are no other choices. A waitress since 13, Maggie sees boxing as the one chance to escape her roots in the southwestern Missouri Ozarks, where her mother cheats the welfare system living in a trailer with Maggie’s sister, a single mother with an infant in her arms.

“She knew one thing. She was trash,� intones the film’s narrator. “Boxing is about respect. Get it for yourself; take it from the other guy.�

Swank, who won an Oscar in 1999 for Best Actress in Boys Don’t Cry, gives a very realistic performance as Maggie. Both Maggie and Frank are stubborn and persistent, but Maggie is more determined. Or perhaps just more hungry. They form a partnership that features some excellent boxing matches as we watch Maggie develop into a powerful fighter.

There have been many great films about boxers. Rocky won an Oscar for showing us the plight of an underdog. Raging Bull is perhaps the most critically acclaimed boxing film for its examination of violence, while On the Waterfront deals with the choices of a former boxer who could have been a contender.

But boxing isn’t the top bill of Million Dollar Baby. Instead the story focuses on the relationship between two friends: a mentor and a protégé, father and daughter figures who long for the restoration of family relationships they valued. We see the highest form of love develop between these two friends – a love that isn’t cheapened with stereotypical Hollywood romance, but that illustrates loyalty, devotion and respect. The film explores the depths of friendship, testing the limits of what one friend can ask another friend to do.

Million Dollar Baby received seven Oscar nominations, including Best Picture along with acting nominations for the film’s three principal characters. Although The Aviator led nominations with 11, Eastwood’s Million Dollar Babywill outsoar Scorsese’s film when the Oscars are announced. It is clearly the best film I’ve seen in the past year, and perhaps Eastwood’s best ever, easily surpassing last year’s Best Picture nominee Mystic River. Yet it may be one of the year’s most controversial films for a major plot twist the film undergoes as it enters its final crisis.

Million Dollar Baby ultimately is a film about choices, especially the decisions we face when our life situations seem to have us against the ropes. Do we despair about the odds being against us or do we hope for what we dream could be possible?

For several reasons, Million Dollar Baby will raise some difficult issues for those who believe films should reinforce moral absolutes. Film does a better job of raising questions, and allowing filmgoers to wrestle with these questions themselves.

Frankie’s decisions are questioned throughout the course of the film. Is he too cautious in trying to protect his fighters? Does he fail to take appropriate risks in pursuit of a championship? Is he doing enough to try to repair a damaged relationship with his estranged daughter? His decision at the film’s climactic point already is rightly debated.

But viewers should keep in mind that, when the film ends, we don’t know how Frankie ultimately will live out his days in response to the moral dilemma he faced. Has he protected himself from guilt and regret? Or has he discovered that he, indeed, has lived his life well? Even when our values are clear, the moral choices we face are seldom clear or easy. The knockout conclusion to Million Dollar Baby will have audiences examining their own values and life choices.

—Overview
—Trailers, Photos
—About this Film pdf
—Spiritual Connections

Super Size Me

—Review
—Trailers, Photos
—About this Film
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Three days into his quest to eat nothing but McDonald’s food for a month, Morgan Spurlock accepts his first invitation to “super-size� his meal. But within 30 minutes of downing his Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese, half-pound of fries and 42-ounce Coke, he throws up the “McLead� he felt in his stomach.

Spurlock survived his 30-day binge, but not before gaining 25 pounds, raising his cholesterol to dangerous levels, and endangering his liver and heart. Physicians monitoring his health and his girlfriend, a vegan chef, urged him to stop after three weeks. His gastronomical trials and tribulations are portrayed in the independent documentary “Super Size Me,� which debuted in January 2004 at the Sundance Film Festival, where Spurlock was named best director.

In nationwide release since May, this Mc-raking documentary succeeds by combining information we’ve all heard about nutrition with biting moments that taste as good as … well, fast food itself, minus any lingering aftertaste or unhealthy side effects.

The 1-hour-and-40-minute film represented quite an education for the 12-, 10- and 7-year-old girls who attended my viewing. The film captivated them. Some moments shocked them. (A middle-school student claims fries are her daily vegetable. Teen-age girls stumble over the words to the Pledge of Allegiance, before flawlessly reciting McDonald’s mantra -- “two all-beef patties, special sauce …�) But there were some inappropriate parts, including some profanity, way too much filming of Spurlock’s medical exams, and his girlfriend’s discussion of the diet’s impact on his sex life. The theatrical release is perhaps equivalent to a PG-13 film.

That’s why a “family-friendly� DVD version is available in addition to standard versions. The filmmakers plan to market it to public schools, beefed up with more than an hour of additional content, including an interview with Eric Schlosser, author of “Fast Food Nation,� which inspired the film.

In a nation where over-eating is overtaking smoking as the No. 1 preventable cause of death, Spurlock sought to replicate a diet that many Americans eat too frequently, although not for every meal in a month. The 6-foot-2, 185-pounder began his film journey in “above average� health for a 33-year-old, according to physicians who monitored his progress. He had three rules:

· Eat only what is on McDonald’s menus.

· “Super size� meals only when asked. (Servers offered him that option nine times during the month.)

· Sample every item on McDonald’s menu (including bottled water and salads) at some point during the month.

Still, this diet plan frequently had Spurlock consuming twice his daily limit of calories. He reported feeling lethargic and depressed, saying that the only time he felt good was when he was consuming another Big Mac. One doctor said the damage occurring to Spurlock’s liver reminded him of what happened to Nicholas Cage’s binging alcoholic in “Leaving Las Vegas.� (Even with cooking from his vegan girlfriend, Spurlock needed about a year to return to normal girth.)

McDonald’s responded to what already is the fourth-highest grossing U.S. documentary with an advertising campaign. It ended its “super size� options six weeks after the film’s debut, insisting the step was unrelated, and recently introduced a new line of “premium salads,� including one that contains more calories than a Big Mac.

This documentary raises anew questions for we who believe one cannot live by bread alone, Why are so many of us eating ourselves to death when others cannot find adequate calories to survive? Are we getting “more with less� when it comes to nutrition by not monitoring the nature (calories, sodium and fat content, for example) of food we consume for the sake of convenience? And why is it that super-sized Christians are among the most prolific at condemning the sins of others? Pecan log, anyone?

One heart-burning question remains for this reviewer: How would someone fare trying to live for 30 days on nothing but church potlucks? I suspect not much better.

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Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events

—Overview
—Review by Kevin Miller
—Trailers, Photos
—Spiritual Connections

The makers of “Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events� showed particular insight in releasing the film during the Christmas season. Not because it’s time for “Christmas to take a holiday,� as the trailer for the film suggests. But because, for Americans familiar with the Dickensian feel behind seasonal favorites like A Christmas Carol, an adaptation of this series highlights, with humor, the dark underside of our society.

The film, and the series of children’s books on which it is based, begins with the three Baudelaire children learning they have become orphans. An unexplained fire has destroyed their home and parents, leaving them with a vast fortune. A heartless banker Mr. Poe (Timothy Spall) is charged with placing these wards with their closest relative. Instead of getting care from a loving family member, the orphans are placed with the diabolical Count Olaf (Jim Carrey), a geographically proximate but emotionally distant relative who is determined to make off with the Baudelaire fortune.

The dark nature of this story is aptly depicted in the film’s visual look and costumes – something that members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences recognized in nominating the film for best art direction and best costume design. The musical score, the film’s third Oscar nomination, also helps set the tone for the story.

The 1-hour and 47-minute film draws from the first three books in what will eventually be a 13-book series: “The Bad Beginning,� “The Reptile Room� and “The Wide Window.� The books are penned by the enigmatic Lemony Snicket (alias Daniel Handler), whose voice is represented in the film by actor Jude Law.

The film does an admirable job of bringing the spirit of the first three books to the screen, even if it awkwardly juggles the sequences a bit to make the dramatic plot of the first book the climactic focus of the film.

Count Olaf, an inept and unemployed actor, through conniving continually dons different disguises in his efforts to steal the Baudelaire fortune. The role seems tailor-made for Carrey. And while he manages to capture some of the silliness of the book, many of his ad-libs are over the top, although not enough to mar a good film.

By contrast, the characterizations of the children are excellent. We quickly understand that when Violet (Emily Browning) ties her hair up, she’s cooking up a mechanical invention, that Klaus (Liam Aiken) photographically remembers what he reads in books, and that the toddler Sunny (Kara and Shelby Hoffman) excels in biting things. Often literary techniques suffer in the translation to film, but the filmmakers here do an excellent job of translating Sunny’s gibberish, understood by the other Baudelaire orphans and explained at length in the novels, through use of subtitles. Sunny’s lines are a scream! -- so much so that actress Meryl Streep (who plays one of the children’s aunt Josephine) described the twins as scene-stealers. Some of their lines do push the boundary of good taste, although the film’s PG rating is primarily for scary situations and brief language.

Some faith-based reviewers are scared off by the books’ light-hearted darkness and have predictably warned that the film teaches children the world is an evil place where adults can’t be trusted. These literalists fail to see that the film, and the series that inspired it, in broad strokes offer a spiritual metaphor for our contemporary society. The basic thrust of the series is that the adults charged with the care of children are either so ill-equipped to protect and care for those children or too self-possessed to bother. While there are many exceptions (represented in this film by Billy Connolly’s fine portrayal of Uncle Monty), that theme has particular poignancy today.

Childhood was never “insulated from the pressures and demands of the surrounding society,� according to a new book, “Huck’s Raft: A History of American Childhood� by Steven Mintz (Harvard University Press). America’s children today, if they are brought into this world and survive unscathed till adulthood, are poised to inherit an unprecedented mountain of federal debt run up, in part, because the wealthiest adults are gorging themselves on the public trough. The disguises of our real-life villains aren’t as obvious as those of Count Olaf.

It has been said that a society is best judged by how it treats its most vulnerable members, particularly its children. The cinematic treatment of the Baudelaire children would seem too outlandish, if it weren’t for the daily news reports that continue to shock us about the abuse of children. Many of our classic fairy tales contain a dark side, which becomes truly evident through a mature reading of the tales. Perhaps this film’s box office success indicates that our society recognizes Lemony Snicket as one of this season’s most fortunate film events for children, families and young adults.

—Overview
—Review by Kevin Miller
—Trailers, Photos
—Spiritual Connections