SOMETIMES IN APRIL (2005, Rwanda, 140 min.), directed by Raoul Peck; screenplay by Raoul Peck; cinematography by Eric Guichard; music by Bruno Coulais; edited by Jacques Comets; with Idris Elba (Augustin Muganza), Oris Erhuero (Honoré Muganza, his brother), Carole Karemera (Jeanne Muganza, his wife), Michelle Rugema (Ann-Marie Muganza, his daughter), Pamela Nomveté (Martine, his fiancée), Abby Mikiibi Nkaaga (Col. Bagosora), Fraser James (Xavier), Noah Emmerich (Lionel), Debra Winger (Prudence Bushnell). In English and Kinyarwanda.

In April the rains return to Rwanda, and for an agricultural land parched by months of dryness, it is a blessing. The cleansing rains bring hope, of renewal and resurrection. But the heavy rains that pound the land also stir up much that is buried in the mud, things long hidden, like the bones of those killed in the genocide of 1994. For April is the anniversary of the onset of those killings. The April rains cause painful memories to stir, and the inevitable questions to rise again: How did it happen? Why did it happen? What could I have done to stop it from happening? Where did I go wrong? Where are my loved ones now?

Sometimes in April, the latest film by the acclaimed Haitian director Raoul Peck, focuses on such individuals, haunted by their memories, struggling to come to terms with the legacy of genocide and its aftermath. Commissioned by HBO Films to make a film about those infamous one hundred days in 1994, Peck instead chose to split the film’s attention between then and now, beginning with now. Thus, unlike the other big feature film on the subject, Hotel Rwanda, Sometimes in April deliberately eschews traditional notions of suspense and heroism in favor of an attempt at authenticity and reflection.

It also seeks to move beyond seeing the events strictly in terms of “Hutu vs. Tutsi,” instead focusing on issues of power, self-interest, fear, and the intoxication of group-think. In one of the film’s most revealing (albeit heavy-handed) moments, a Washington reporter asks the Assistant Secretary of State about the “Tutus and Hutsis,” and inquires as to who are the “good guys” and who are the “bad guys.” This film attempts to show that things were (and are) much more complicated than that.

The film opens (after some introductory historical/didactic background) in April 2004, the tenth anniversary of the massacres. Augustin Muganza, a secondary school teacher, listens with his class to President Clinton’s 1998 apology to the Rwandan people, his pledge that the world must “never again” allow such a thing to occur. Augustin, played by the excellent British actor Idris Elba (known for his stage work and for his role on the HBO series, The Wire), is a man haunted by the past, and by his own inability in the past to protect his family and those around him. A Hutu, he was formerly a captain in the Rwandan army. (He was perhaps forced to leave the army because he is a Hutu; or perhaps he gave it up voluntarily, out of disillusionment with its inability to stop the massacres; or perhaps he sees teaching as a way to influence the future—or perhaps it’s a combination.) His wife was a Tutsi, his daughter and his two sons technically Hutu (“race” is a function of the father’s legacy), but all are now gone. He lives now with Martine, a strong, solicitous, loving (presumably Hutu) woman, who we eventually learn was formerly his daughter’s schoolmistress. She would like them to marry and move on, but even after ten years, Augustin still cannot remove the wedding ring that united him with Jeanne, his late wife.

And he has a brother. His brother, Honoré, is now on trial at the War Crimes Tribunal in Arusha, Tanzania. Honoré had once been a prominent broadcaster for Radio Mille-Collines/Radio Thousand Hills (Rwanda is known as the “Land of a Thousand Hills”), one of those inciting the Hutu population to exterminate the “Tutsi Cockroaches,” inflaming their paranoia, resentment (the Tutsi had been the favored group under the European colonialists), and fear. Among the Hutu extremists, Honoré had been a celebrity. And now, he is among those “privileged” with prosecution by the International tribunal. (Most of the former Hutu killers had their cases handled by local “truth and reconciliation” tribunals, known as gacacas.) Augustin receives a letter from his brother, begging him to come to Arusha to see him; in exchange, he will tell Augustin the truth about how his wife died. Augustin, however, wants nothing to do with his brother. He holds him responsible for the fate of the nation, and more specifically for the fate of his family. The very thought of his brother fills him with contempt and bitterness. In the end, though, pressed by Martine (who believes that if he is to come to terms with the past and move beyond it, Augustin must confront his brother and hear what he has to say), he goes to Arusha.

We move then into the past, where most of the film will remain, reverting to the present from time to time—both to give us a reprieve from the horror and terror, and to give us perspective on the events of 1994. We see Honoré at the radio station. We see Augustin, ordered to train the Hutu militias (the so-called Interahamwes), who supposedly are being trained to resist the invading Tutsi rebel army, the RPF, led by General (now President) Paul Kagame. He is deeply disturbed by everything he sees around him, and so are we. Clearly, awful things are about to happen. He should have fled the country long before, but as a patriot and a military man, that is unthinkable; as a result, he has put his family at grave risk. Honoré tells him that he is on a list of those “moderate” Hutu targeted for arrest; he urges him to reject his family and think of saving his own skin.

With the assassination of the Rwandan president, the long-prepared genocide commences, and we are plunged into a world of confusion, horror, and despair, much of it shown in graphic detail. We see Augustin lose his family and friends. We see Martine lose her beloved girls. By the end of the nightmare, there is a kind of weariness to it all, exemplified by a Hutu man who goes off to his daily killing with an air of resignation, the work of brutality that has long ago lost any meaning (his wife will briefly shelter Martine and two wounded girls). Again, thanks to the film’s strategy of moving back and forth between past and present, there is an inevitability to all that occurs—although we do not know the specific fate of every individual, we know that this will not end until 800,000 Rwandans—Tutsis and Hutu moderates—will have been cut down, until the RPF rebel army prevails and puts an end to the genocide.

From time to time, we also are taken to Washington, D.C., to be reminded of the refusal of the West to act, reminded that for most Westerners, this horror was just one small hiccup in the media cacophony. For Raoul Peck, these cutaways are essential to give the events their larger political dimension, but it may also be (though he might deny this) that this was due to the influence of HBO—it was important to make the events more directly relevant to a U.S. audience, even if the vehicle for that relevance is ultimately a sense of responsibility and guilt.

In the end, Augustin does confront his brother (inspired by the courage of a woman survivor who testifies at the trial) and learns that the truth of what occurred is more complex than he had thought. Indeed, the film is pervaded by a kind of complexity that does not really exist in Hotel Rwanda. Augustin, our hero, is not a hero in the traditional Hollywood sense. He saves no one. In fact, he can be held responsible for the deaths of his family and his best friend. He is a survivor, a decent man in an impossible situation, our vehicle for witnessing the lessons of this experience. Because on some level, this is a profoundly traditional African film—that is, a film whose purpose is not escapism or catharsis, but rather to serve as a bridge to the present, to provide us with a framework with which to judge ourselves, our actions, and our commitments today.

* * *

Director Raoul Peck is a prominent internationalist and cultural figure, and not only through his work in film. He was born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, which his family fled in 1961 (during the repressive Duvalier dictatorship), when he was eight years old. He was raised in Congo/Zaire, where his family was to remain for the next 25 years. He attended school in New York City and in France, then studied Economics and Industrial Engineering in Germany. With his degree in hand, he took the next logical step: returned to New York and drove a cab for a year. He then secured a coveted spot at the German Film and Television Academy (DFFB) in Berlin. While still a student there, he made his first feature film, Haitian Corner, shot in Brooklyn and in Haiti. His returned to Africa for his excellent documentary Lumumba, Death of a Prophet, made in 1992, followed in 1993 with his acclaimed L’Homme sur les quais/Man on the Shore (CFAF 14), set in Duvalier-era Haiti. Peck returned to Haiti to serve briefly (1997-98) as Minister of Culture. He went back to filmmaking, doing documentary work and then the brilliant feature film Lumumba (2000, CFAF 12). Lumumba was subsequently shown on HBO, which led to the commission to make Sometimes in April). He has received numerous awards for his work in film.

Peck has served as President of the Caribbean Federation of Film and Video and is a member of the German Writer's Guild and the French Authors/Directors/Producer's Guild (ARP). In April 2000 he was named President of the French commission "Fond Sud" which allocates production funds of 2.5 million U.S. dollars in over 85 countries. He is also the Founder of the Fondation Forum Eldorado, dedicated to cultural development in Haiti and the Caribbean and working with schools and underprivileged communities in Haiti.

--Notes by Michael Dembrow

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