Iseta Behind the Roadblock

The genocide in Rwanda, which took place from 6 April to 4 July 1994, was one of the cruellest events of the 20th century. The conflict took between 800,000 and a million lives, giving it the highest death rate per day of all genocides in history. The provocation was the assassination of Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana. His plane was shot at in the capital of Kigali and it crashed without leaving any survivors. That night, the genocide in Rwanda began, organised by the Hutu government and directed against the Front Patriotique Rwandais and the Tutsi population, whom the Hutus held responsible for the murder of the president. On a quiet road in Kigali, some of the first victims fell. Coincidentally, a British cameraman named Juan Reina was present at the time and captured the slaughter from the top of the French School. In Iseta Behind the Roadblock, he returns to Kigali and talks to people who were involved, giving these people a face in the process. Reina shows the footage, according to the film the only images of the massacre, to the survivors, who in turn try to identify the perpetrators. Iseta Behind the Roadblock is an attempt to tell the human story behind the cold casualty figures. (International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam)