Beyond the Gates is set at a Roman Catholic school in Rwanda at the beginning of that country’s genocide in 1994 with the key characters being Father Christopher (John Hurt) and a teacher named Joe Connor (Hugh Dancy).
Any movie with such a heavy story line is difficult to pull off but director Michael Caton-Jones (Memphis Belle, Rob Roy) manages it by adding just enough hope to a desperate situation. As the genocide begins Tutsis flee their homes to find any protection they can and since there is a contingent of UN troops from Belgium on the campus of the school hundreds seek refuge there. As such it becomes a high profile target for the Hutu militias and a mob forms just “beyond the gates”.
It is no surprise that the United Nations is portrayed as not just useless but actually harmful to the Tutsis in need of protection. This is shown in a couple of powerful scenes. The first involves a conversation where Capitaine Delon (Dominique Horwitz) informs Father Christopher that he is going to shoot the gathering dogs because they posed a health risk. Christoper snaps back, “Have the dogs opened fire on you?” as the UN can only fire upon the Hutu mobs if they are shot at first, even though the health risk they pose is infinitely higher. (the original UK release is entitled "Shooting Dogs")
Another is when French UN troops come to the school to evacuate all the white people gathered but refuse to evacuate the black people. And when the UN finally orders their troops to leave they leave the Tutsis worse than defenseless because if the UN troops had not been there in the first place the people would not have penned themselves into common slaughter point.
But as I mentioned there is an inkling of hope. The use of faith as a source of strength and comfort was not your typical Hollywood fare though the (as much as you possibly get) Hollywood ending was a welcome respite from the horror the movie portrays. How can you say that you enjoyed a film like this but the acting was strong and the story was well told.
Comments (1)
Well, I agree the UN buggered it up there, but not for lack of trying by the folks in the ground, if you have read “Shake Hands with the Devil”. The biggest problem was that the Belgians were the former colonial rulers of Rwanda and they created the Hutu-Tutsi animosity in the first place.
And while the UN guys in New York balked (hey what was his name? oh yeah Kofi Anan…) Dallaire and a sizeable number of his African troops (Nigerians, Tunisians) refused to leave and did not.
Just want you to be clear that when you slam the UN you are talking about the pin heads in New York, not the non-Belgian guys on the ground.
Posted by Mike | March 8, 2007 8:05 AM
Posted on March 8, 2007 08:05