CS Weekly Archive > Weekend Read > 12/09/06

Diamond in the Rough

By danny munso

Two men's harrowing search for a rare stone and a lost child deftly blends epic set pieces with a personal, heartfelt story to create one of the year's most powerful films.

Blood Diamond

Screenplay by Charles Leavitt
Story by Charles Leavitt and C. Gaby Mitchell

In 1990's Sierra Leone, fisherman Solomon Vandy (Djimon Hounsou) is taken from his wife and children to work as a slave in the local diamond mines where he ends up discovering the rarest of all precious stones: a pink diamond. During a government raid, Solomon buries the stone and ends up in prison, where he meets Danny Archer (Leonardo DiCaprio), a diamond smuggler who sees the gem as his ticket out of Africa. The two set out across the country to reclaim the diamond and find Solomon's family, aided by American journalist Maddy Bowen (Jennifer Connelly), who wants to pen an expose on conflict diamonds and thinks she's found a perfect source in Archer. As their journey continues, Solomon discovers his son has been kidnapped by the rebel group R.U.F., and the trio's journey becomes more personal, and more perilous.

Blood Diamond is the rare epic film that wears its message clearly on its sleeve. The issue of conflict diamonds, and the number of lives each one costs, has long been a subject of debate. Writer Charles Leavitt and director Edward Zwick place it front and center. Zwick, in particular, is a filmmaker that likes his films to have plenty of moral food for thought, whether it's his brilliant Civil War film Glory or the almost-great The Last Samurai (even 1998's problematic The Siege dealt with important political issues several years before 9/11 brought them to the forefront). Although there are a few times Blood Diamond preaches to the crowd a little too hard, the story proves to be a commanding presence on screen, attempting to educate its audience while thrilling the hell out of them.

One of the more impressive elements of the film concerns its leading man, Danny Archer, who is full of heroic qualities yet far from a hero. Kudos to Leavitt for painting the film's centerpiece as a self-serving mercenary who has just enough heart to do the right thing (well, most of the time). Archer is, in other words, human, rather than a larger-than-life South African Indiana Jones. Yes, he is willing to help Solomon find his family, but mainly at his own benefit. And, yes, he agrees to help Maddy blow the whistle on the British government's involvement with conflict diamonds, but you get the feeling he's doing it more to sleep with her than to clear his conscience. Despite Archer's flaws, or perhaps because of them, the audience has a real connection with him. When he acts bravely, we expect nothing less of him, and when his desperation and greed come to the forefront, we empathize.

The only real drawback to the script is its tendency to talk down to the audience. Before we hit the jungles of Africa, we are treated to a posh council meeting where the harsh realities of conflict diamonds are laid out one by one. This proves to be a stirring set-up for the film's upcoming chain of events. The problem is, this isn't the only time we will hear them. As if they thought the local multiplex crowd might not get it the first time around, Leavitt and Zwick continue to hammer home the chain of events set off by buying these illegal gems. You wish the filmmakers would have realized they did a good job the first time around. And if they were worried about being accused of preaching, well, they probably shouldn't have hired the dad from 7th Heaven to do most of it.

Oddly enough, for all the buzz surrounding the film dealing with the plot's revelations about the diamond industry, the emotional core of the story ends up being Solomon's search for his stolen child, whom the R.U.F. has brainwashed and trained as a mercenary. Without losing focus on Archer's search for the pink diamond, Leavitt and Zwick begin weaving Solomon's plight into the tale, and because of well-written, powerful scenes early in the film, Solomon's search for his son becomes more beautiful than any rare gem could ever hope to be.

Even if you ignore the strong message being sent, Charles Leavitt's script is a gripping story that can thrill, elate, and horrify, sometimes all at once. Combined with its important warnings, the film becomes that much more. A lot of movies try and change the world, but Blood Diamond is great enough that it just might succeed.

Blood Diamond

Warner Bros.
Rated R; 138 min.

Buy tickets now

Danny Munso graduated from film school in 2004 and can currently be found on his computer working on one of his many half-written screenplays. Or, more likely, he's on the Internet checking the scores of his beloved Bay Area sports teams.

Blood Diamond courtesy Warner Bros.

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