Blood Diamond
Review by Fritz Esker
2006 has seen the release of a handful of films that fall into the category of Incredibly Well-Meaning Films That Are Really, Really Hard to Dislike But Just Aren’t That Good (An Inconvenient Truth, Fast Food Nation). Edward Zwick’s (Glory, The Last Samurai) new film, Blood Diamond, can also be lumped into that category.
In 1999, a horrific civil war took place in Sierra Leone that was almost entirely ignored by the rest of the world. Much of it centered on the country’s very lucrative diamond mines. The mines, which supplied many of the outlets that serve American consumers, featured slave labor, countless murders, and other unthinkable conditions. Blood Diamond aims to educate the world about what went on in Sierra Leone and the human cost behind the diamonds Americans are so fond of buying.
Djimon Hounsou (Amistad) plays Solomon, a fisherman whose village is attacked by revolutionaries. He is kidnapped and put to work at the diamond mines. His wife and two of his children end up in a refugee camp, while his oldest son is conscripted by the revolutionaries, who brainwash him, give him a steady diet of heroin, and make him into one of their own soldiers (perhaps the most disturbing aspect of the Sierra Leone conflict was the fact that many of the participants were children). Hounsou discovers an extremely valuable diamond and manages to escape after hiding the diamond. He crosses paths with Danny Archer (Leonardo DiCaprio), a mercenary and diamond smuggler. Danny views the diamond as his ticket out of Africa and Hounsou thinks it can buy him back his family.
One of the central dilemmas facing Zwick is one I first remember seeing in Roland Joffe’s 1984 film The Killing Fields (a better film than Blood Diamond). The Killing Fields took place during the Cambodian auto-genocide initiated by Pol Pot. Once all hell breaks loose, the second half of the film deals with the efforts of a Cambodian interpreter to survive the death camps. However, the power of this storyline is undercut by the insistence of devoting screen time to the anguished American journalist who is worried about his friend the interpreter. Similarly, the Solomon storyline in Blood Diamond is powerful, but it often disappears so the audience can be treated to a relationship the DiCaprio character has with an American freelance journalist (Jennifer Connelly). The reasoning behind this is fairly obvious: American audiences need a character (more directly, a white character) to relate to in order to care about the story of a Sierra Leonian or a Cambodian.
The problem this creates for the script is that Hounsou’s character ends up being little more than a noble victim. While the impoverished characters of The Wire are multi-dimensional and always feel like real people, Hounsou’s character here feels like little more than a victim. DiCaprio’s character presents another challenge to the script. He needs to be amoral enough to be convincing as a mercenary, but not so callous that the audience will dislike him. That is a tough tightrope to walk, and the script does not entirely pull it off. Once again, however, DiCaprio proves himself an actor to be reckoned with.
Despite these flaws, much of the film’s first two-thirds is still reasonably watchable. Unfortunately, the third act deteriorates into action movie drudgery and the film rambles on for at least a few scenes past the point where it should have ended (the film runs at 138 minutes). I can sympathize with what Zwick is trying to do here. He is trying to get Americans to pay attention to an issue that has been almost completely ignored. While I can’t say for sure what is going on in the man’s head, I’m guessing he told the story the way he told it so he could get the film’s legitimately important message out to the widest possible audience. Zwick’s made something of a career out of making films like this. However, Blood Diamond does not even succeed entirely as entertainment (although it is a step up from The Last Samurai). Two of Zwick’s previous efforts, Glory and 1998’s The Siege, did much better jobs at educating people about important current and/or historical issues within the framework of a conventionally entertaining Hollywood film.
That being said, Zwick’s intentions are noble and it’s an issue more people should know about. If Zwick’s latest film raises awareness and encourages some people to take action, then more power to him.