Harrowing drama set during the Rwandan genocide in 1994. Joe Connor (Hugh Dancy) is a British schoolteacher who takes up a teaching post and arrives in the Rwandan capital just as ethnic and tribal tensions start to increase between the Hutu and Tutsi groups. As the growing tensions starts to spill into the corridors of his school, Joe strikes up a friendship with Catholic priest Father Christopher (John Hurt), who has come to the country as a missionary. When violence erupts in the country, Joe's school becomes the base for a Belgian peacekeeping force, and along with Father Christopher, Joe decides to remain behind and use the school as a refuge for the persecuted Tutsis - until the Belgian soldiers leave, and they are all put in terrible danger.