Toronto. Munyurangabo.

"[Robert] Koehler's Variety review penned from Cannes motivated me to catch Munyurangabo at its sole Toronto International P&I screening. Koehler proclaims that Munyurangabo is the flat-out 'discovery of this year's Un Certain Regard batch' and 'is - by several light years - the finest and truest film yet on the moral and emotional repercussions of the 15-year-old genocide that wracked Rwanda.' I couldn't agree more," writes Michael Guillén, who then interviews the director and screenwriter Samuel Anderson at the Evening Class.

"To this point in the festival, my favorite of the entire week has been Munyurangabo, which more than lives up to the weighty expectations I had for it," wrote Tom Hall mid-fest. "Lee Issac Chung has done something absolutely remarkable, creating a moving, powerful film about the Rwandan genocide that combines hope and reconciliation with a visual and narrative style that wouldn't be out of place in George Washington; It's an African film that doesn't feel like an 'African film,' a hybrid of styles (American independent film aesthetic and an African storytelling sensibility) that against all odds works magically."

"Unlike Hotel Rwanda and Sometimes in April, Munyurangabo plays out the horrendous conflict (Hutus massacred Tutsis and moderate Hutus) on an intimate scale, without the foreign stars the other films found de rigeuer," writes Howard Feinstein for Filmmaker. His verdict: "astonishing."

Posted by dwhudson at September 21, 2007 1:55 PM