Educational Media Reviews Online

During the spring and early summer of 1994 in Rwanda, nearly 20% of the country’s population was murdered during a period lasting approximately 100 days. The genocide primarily pitted the majority Hutu population against the minority Tutsis, and the events of that period left significant battle scars for the surviving Rwandans - scars that are still healing for many. As we hear one young man explain in the opening frames of Leah Warshawski and Chris Towey’s documentary Finding Hillywood, “We’re trying to move a step forward each and every day.”

One way Rwandans are moving forward is by telling stories, and Finding Hillywood is a story about telling stories – namely, Rwandan films that are in many cases inspired by or directly about the genocide. The Rwandan film industry is still in its nascent stages, and Finding Hillywood chronicles part of its evolution by sharing the stories of several Rwandan filmmakers. Hillywood is a traveling film festival, bringing Rwandan-made films to rural communities throughout the country, and yet it is much more than that. Many of the individuals involved with Hillywood see the festival as a jumping-off point for healing and change in local communities, a way to help audiences move forward, a way to tell different sides of the genocide story by teaching people how to make movies.

Focusing heavily on one senior filmmaker (Ayuub Kasasa Mago), Finding Hillywood cleverly incorporates clips from several other directors’ films as they are shown at the Hillywood festivals. Understated in its approach, the film is well edited and contains several short animated sequences. Occasional subtitles are included in English for passages spoken in French, as well as for heavily-accented English. A welcome accompaniment to both feature and non-fiction films about the Rwandan genocide such as 100 Days (2001), Keepers of Memory (2004), and Hotel Rwanda (2004), Finding Hillywood would support courses in history, political science, media studies, and film, among others. Public libraries would also benefit from adding this title to their collections.