"Blood Diamond" (Warner Brothers)
Another Saga of Africa
"Blood Diamond" is the latest in a somewhat lengthy series of movies about Africa and its struggles and conflicts. "The Constant Gardner" and Catch A Fire" both told stories of modern problems facing this great continent, and neither was a major success at the box office. "Blood Diamond" deals with the tricky question of "conflict diamonds" being bartered in the world. These are diamonds that are sold to help finance war and atrocities.
Leonardo DiCaprio plays Danny Archer a native South African who is a soldier of fortune trafficking in "conflict" diamonds and other "get rich quick" schemes. He learns that a man named Solomon Vandy (Djimon Honsou) knows where a huge diamond has been buried. Danny contacts Solomon and learns the man will only trade information about the diamond for information about his son, who was captured by guerillas in Sierra Leone.
With the help of a beautiful journalist named Maddy (Jennifer Connelly), the two men go after his son. The adventure is risky but it opens up Danny’s eyes to the true horrors of what the diamond trade is doing.
On paper this sounds like an exciting movie – but it isn’t. It bogs down before it even gets started. Both DiCaprio and Connelly’s characters are ones that we have seen before in better movies. Plus there is absolutely no connection or passion between the two characters so the "love story" gets lost in translation.
Honsou is good in the film and as long as the camera is on him and involves his search for his son the movie is worth viewing. But too often those pesky characters played by DiCaprio and Connelly stumble into view and ruin everything.
The film is rated R for violence and profanity.
The film runs two and a half hours and that is too long for this one note story. It exhausts the viewers and numbs their minds. A little editing would have gone a long way especially in the DiCaprio/Connelly portion of the film.
DiCaprio was the weak link in the DiCaprio/Damon/Nicholson trinity of "The Departed." Now he stumbles with this role. How long can he keep getting these juicy parts! Connelly is an actress who is as good as her co-star’s talents. Russell Crowe brought out the best in her in "A Beautiful Mind". DiCaprio brings out the worst of her talent in this film.
There are a lot of tragedies occurring in Africa daily. Some day someone will be able to capture the struggles on film in an interesting way. At present the continent of Africa remains a mystery and its stories are still waiting to be told in a provocative and touching way. "Blood Diamond" tried but it failed.
I scored "Blood Diamond" a low carat 5 out of 10.
