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Festival Films A-Z
Keepers of Memory
Link Media Production
BP 4065
Kigali, Rwanda
Tel: +250 572 875
Mobil: +250 083 064
Email: erickabera@yahoo.com
Website: www.linkmedia.co.rw
Fabien Muhire
Kavila Matu
Synopsis
Using a simple and unobtrusive documentary style, Eric Kabera introduces us to the 'keepers', men and women who watch over the massacre sites in Rwanda - people who have become custodians not only of the dead, but also of their memory. By taking on the task of preserving these unconventional graves, the keepers have made the conscious choice to bear witness to the horrific events of 1994 and to pass on the full story to future generations.
A Tutsi herdsman and genocide survivor sits atop a pastoral outpost on a hill in Bisesero, reflects on the loss of his family and friends during the massacre, and comments, "This place used to be beautiful. Now the only beauty is the skeletons on the mountains". He criticises the continued re-appearance (and opportunism) of international journalists in the area since the end of the genocide. They conduct interviews with survivors, only to go away and effect little change on their situation: "Can't you see we're dying?" It is a sentiment of profound desolation, resignation, unreconciled grief, and impotence that echoes through the testimonials of several survivors at each of six major sites of the 1994 Rwandan genocide.
Keepers of Memory is a deeply personal account of the human tragedy that continues to haunt its often forgotten, marginalised, and globally abandoned survivors. Contrasting the inarticulable grief of the victims with the carefully wordsmithed, olive-branch speeches from representatives of the international community, the film serves as a provocative and powerfully moving indictment of factionalism, moral complicity through abstention and inertia, and human indifference.
After the screening of Keepers of Memory, director Eric Kabera and Dr. Eckhart Dietzfelbinger from the Nuremberg Documentation Centre Nazi Party Rally Grounds will discuss how a genocide can and should be remembered - both in Germany and in Rwanda.
Biography
Rowing into the Sunrise (2005), Keepers of Memory (2004), Moment on Earth (2004), Changing Times in Challenging Times (1997)
Filmography
Rowing into the Sunrise (2005), Keepers of Memory (2004), Moment on Earth (2004), Changing Times in Challenging Times (1997)
Dates
| 75 | 07.10.2007 | 19:00 | Festsaal |