Week 8 - Saturday, January 16th, 2015 - Rwandan Genocide / Iron Jawed Angels
Aim: How do historical films change the way society views historic events?
Iron Jawed Angels
Iron Jawed Angels is the 2004 film that tells the story of two lesser known advocates, Alice Paul and Lucy Burns and their fight for women's suffrage. The story is a gruesome, real story of how the 19th amendment came to be. The plot involves hunger strikes, imprisonment, brutal beatings, a parade, and women fighting for a great cause.
Paula Weinstein, an executive producer of the film, believes that this is a movie that all women must see. The cast and crew of the film were mainly women. This gave those working on the film a greater appreciation for the events which the movie portrays. Weinstein said that it gave the women on set a sense of sisterhood. Paula Weinstein always tries to hire women for her films. For Iron Jawed Angels it was a no brainer to hire women.
Katja von Garnier's "Iron Jawed Angels" tells the remarkable and little-known story of a group of passionate and dynamic young women, led by Alice Paul (Hilary Swank) and her friend Lucy Burns (Frances O'Connor), who put their lives on the line to fight for American women's right to vote.
Swank and O'Connor head an outstanding female ensemble, with Julia Ormond, Molly Parker, Laura Fraser, Brooke Smith and Vera Farmiga as a rebel band of young women seeking their seat at the table; and such cinematic icons as Lois Smith, Margo Martindale, and Anjelica Huston as the steely older generation of suffragettes.
This true story has startling parallels to today, as the young activists struggle with issues such as the challenges of protesting a popular President during wartime and the perennial balancing act between love and career. Utilizing a pulsing soundtrack, vivid colors, and a freewheeling camera, Katja von Garnier's ("bandits") driving filmmaking style shakes up the preconceptions of the period film and gives history a vibrant contemporary energy and relevance.
In 1912 Philadelphia, young suffragist activists Alice Paul (Hilary Swank) and Lucy Burns (Frances O'Connor) have a meeting with Carrie Chapman Catt (Anjelica Huston) and Anna Howard Shaw (Lois Smith) of NAWSA (National American Woman Suffrage Association, formed in 1890 by Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton). The breezy, rebellious spirit of the two younger activists is in stark contrast to the more conservative older women. Paul and Burns want to press for a constitutional amendment for women to have the right to vote, but the older women prefer a state-by-state approach. Still, Paul is permitted to take over NAWSA's Washington, D.C. committee, provided she and Burns raise their own funds. They begin planning their first big event, a parade to promote women's suffrage, and recruit a team of volunteers, including Alice's college friend Mabel Vernon (Brooke Smith), Polish factory worker Ruza Wenclawska (Vera Farmiga) and social worker Doris Stevens (Laura Fraser).
While soliciting donations at an art gallery, Paul convinces labor lawyer Inez Mulholland (Julia Ormond) to serve as a figurehead for the parade and meets a Washington newspaper political cartoonist, Ben Weissman (Patrick Dempsey), causing romantic sparks to fly. Returning to Washington, President Woodrow Wilson (Bob Gunton) finds himself ignored, while across town, the parade turns into a riot, with hecklers attacking the suffragettes. Paul and Burns are pleased with the resulting front page publicity, and over Catt's objections, seek to press their advantage by leading a delegation to see President Wilson. He puts them off with promises to study the issue, and the women lobby members of Congress to get the suffrage amendment to the floor for a vote, but it dies in committee.
Paul and Burns further antagonize Catt when they raise funds outside of NAWSA to publish a newspaper calling for women to boycott Wilson in the next election. Paul presses Weissman to help the cause, and agrees to go on a date with him. She is taken aback when Weissman, a widower, brings his young son to dinner with them. Although attracted to Weissman, Paul chooses to forego a relationship with him in order to devote herself completely to the suffrage cause.
When Catt calls for an NAWSA board investigation into the expenditures of Paul and Burns, they leave the organization to form the National Woman's Party (NWP), which opposes any candidate against the proposed constitutional amendment. The NWP disrupts President Wilson's speech to Congress with a protest, and the influential Senator Leighton (Joseph Adams) cuts off his wife Emily's (Molly Parker) allowance after discovering she has made donations to the NWP. The women embark on a cross-country speaking tour for the cause, and an exhausted Mulholland asks to remain home, but Paul convinces her to come along.
World War I begins, and President Wilson seems headed for victory in the reelection campaign. Feeling it's better to have a friend than a foe in the White House, Catt tries to convince Paul and Burns to withdraw from the campaign. In San Francisco, an ailing Mulholland collapses and dies. Feeling that she is responsible for Mulholland's death, Paul retreats to her Quaker family's farm, until Burns arrives and convinces her to continue the fight. They return to Washington, with a bold plan to picket the White House. Senator Leighton objects to his wife's increasing involvement with the NWP, and she walks out on him.
Wartime fervor turns public opinion against the suffragettes, who are arrested on the trumped-up charge of "obstructing traffic," even though their picket line is on the sidewalk. Refusing to pay a fine for a crime they didn't commit, the women are sentenced to sixty days in an Occoquan, Virginia women's prison. Insisting that they're political prisoners, Burns demands the warden respect their rights, only to be cuffed with her arms above her cell door. In solidarity and defiance, the other suffragettes assume Burns' painful posture.
When Paul and Mrs. Leighton join the picket line, they are attacked by a mob, and subsequently imprisoned themselves. Thrown into solitary confinement for breaking a window for fresh air, Paul goes on a hunger strike. She is then denied counsel, placed in a straitjacket, and subjected to examination in the psychiatric ward. The doctor tells President Wilson that Paul shows no signs of mania or delusion, and she returns to the prison's general population, where she leads the suffragettes on a hunger strike. The warden begins force-feeding them, and a sympathetic guard sneaks Paul pen and paper.
Catt tries to get President Wilson to repay her years of loyalty by finally supporting the suffrage amendment, but he refuses. Senator Leighton visits his wife in prison, and is appalled by her condition. During their meeting, she slips him Paul's note, describing in detail their mistreatment. Word of the force-feeding leaks out, and public opinion shifts in favor of the suffragettes, now known as the "iron jawed angels." Catt seizes the moment to press President Wilson into supporting the suffrage amendment, and the women are released from prison as he comes out in its favor in a Congressional speech.
By 1920, 35 states have ratified the amendment, but one more state is needed. Tennessee becomes that state when a recalcitrant legislator casts the deciding vote after receiving a telegram from his mother (a real life event). On Aug. 26, 1920, the Susan B. Anthony Amendment becomes law, and 20 million American women win the right to vote.
Iron Jawed Angels - History of the Suffragette Movement
- Timeline of Women's Suffrage in the United States
- National American Woman Suffrage Association
- Night of Terror leads to Womens Vote in 1917
- Alice Paul
- Lucy Burns
- Inez Milholland Boissevain
- Ida B Wells
- Carrie Chapman Catt
- National Archives - 19th Amendment
Iron Jawed Angels - Fact verses Fiction
Hotel Rwanda
Hotel Rwanda is a 2004 American historical drama film directed by Terry George. It was adapted from a screenplay written by both George and Keir Pearson. It stars Don Cheadle and Sophie Okonedo as hotelier Paul Rusesabagina and his wife Tatiana. Based on the Rwandan Genocide which occurred during the spring of 1994, the film, which has been called an African Schindler's List, documents Rusesabagina's acts to save the lives of his family and more than a thousand other refugees by granting them shelter in the besieged Hôtel des Mille Collines.[3] Hotel Rwanda explores genocide, political corruption, and the repercussions of violence.[4]
Tensions between the Hutu and Tutsi peoples lead to a war in Rwanda, where corruption and bribes between politicians are routine. Paul Rusesabagina (Cheadle), the manager of the Sabena owned Hôtel des Mille Collines, is Hutu, but his wife Tatiana (Okonedo), is Tutsi. His marriage is a source of friction with Hutu extremists, most prominently Georges Rutaganda (Kae-Kazim), a friendly goods supplier to the hotel who is also the local leader of Interahamwe, a brutal Hutu militia.
As the political situation in the country worsens following the assassination of the president, Paul and his family observe neighbors being killed in ethnic violence, initiating the early stages of a genocide. Paul curries favor with people of influence, bribing them with money and alcohol, seeking to maintain sufficient influence to keep his family safe. When civil war erupts and a Rwandan Army officer threatens Paul and his neighbors, Paul barely negotiates their safety, and brings them to the hotel. More evacuees arrive at the hotel from the overburdened UN refugee camp, the Red Cross, and various orphanages. Paul must divert the Hutu soldiers, care for the refugees, be a source of strength to his family, and maintain the appearance of a functioning hotel as the situation becomes more violent.
The UN Peacekeeping forces, led by Canadian Colonel Oliver (Nolte), are unable to take assertive action against the Interahamwe since they are forbidden to intervene in the genocide. The foreign nationals are evacuated, but the Rwandans are left behind. When the UN forces attempt to evacuate a group of refugees, including Paul's family, they are ambushed and must turn back. In a last-ditch effort to save the refugees, Paul pleads with the Rwandan Army General, Augustin Bizimungu (Mokoena) for assistance. However, when Paul's bribes no longer work, he blackmails the General with threats of being tried as a war criminal. Soon after, the family and the hotel refugees are finally able to leave the besieged hotel in a UN convoy. They travel through retreating masses of refugees and militia to reach safety behind Tutsi rebel lines.
The film's epilogue displays a series of graphics stating that Rusesabagina saved 1,268 Rwandan refugees at the Hôtel des Mille Collines, and now lives in Belgium with his family. It notes that Rutaganda and General Bizimungu were tried and convicted by the UN for war crimes in 2002, while also conveying that the genocide ended in July 1994 leaving almost a million people dead.
Sources
- "Hotel Rwanda". The Numbers. Retrieved 2010-09-19.
- "Hotel Rwanda". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2010-06-04.
- Burr, Ty (January 7, 2005). "Hotel Rwanda Movie Review: Cheadle brings quiet power to 'Rwanda'". The Boston Globe. Retrieved 2007-04-09.
- Terry George. (2004). Hotel Rwanda [Motion picture]. United States: United Artists.