"Spoilers" Blood Diamond tells the story of Sierra Leone's bloody diamond trade which funds their civil wars. The story focuses on a native fisherman named Solomon played by Djimon "Us is Free in Amistad" Hounsou who loses his family after rebel forces are raping and pillaging the country side. He is captured and forced to work in a diamond mining camp where he stumbles across a huge diamond. He quickly hides it though because the guy in charge of the camp is a jerk rebel who secretly beats Manthas at night. DiCaprio's Danny Archer character comes along and wants the diamond because he is a smuggler. Then Jennifer Connelly comes along and puts some good looks in the story. Now it's up to the three to find the diamond and save Solomons family before it is too late. "End of Spoilers"
From what I have heard, this movie portrays the events in Sierra Leone during the late 1990's pretty true to what actually happened. There are a lot of blood diamonds (conflict diamonds) that are probably on many peoples engagement and wedding rings and they don't even know it. If you saw this movie, you would probably not want to buy conflict diamonds that fund the violence and the killings going on in Africa. This movie doesn't shy away from that violence and shows you first hand what was going on and probably still going on in parts of Africa. There is an underlying political theme in the movie about countries and their hunger for natural resources that is relative today. There are are actually many stories going on here but like I said earlier, the focus is on DiCaprio and Djimon.
I thought the acting was well done in this movie by all the leads. DiCaprio always does a good job in his movies and I hope he gets the Golden Globe (He was nominated for a Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Drama for The Departed and Blood Diamond. He was good in both so I don't care which one he wins in. That being said, I do think The Departed was a better movie but Blood Diamond is good in it's own right.
The movie was directed by Edward Zwick who directed the excellent movie "Glory" and the Denzen infested "The Siege Tank" and the Tom Cruise infested "The Last Samaurai". He didn't top Glory here and I think that's hard to do. He did top "The Seige" and "The Last Samaurai" though. The Last Samaurai was good but I think Tom Cruise kind of made that movie more hokey and less believeable than this one. This movie is definitely more realistic. Anyway I give this movie 3.4 stars out of 4. Not the best movie of the year but close to the top.
P.S. Don't buy Conflict Diamonds. You can ask the Jeweler where the diamonds are from and they can provide you with a certificate stating that these are not Conflict Diamonds. You will be funding wars and senseless violence if you do.
Welcome to Africa, hope you enjoy your stay. Remember at all times though, TIA.
