AcademyAward\u00AE nominees Leonardo DiCaprio and Djimon Hounsou join Academy Award\u00AE winner Jennifer Connelly in this action drama from Ed Zwick, the filmmaker behind The Last Samurai. DiCaprio stars as Danny Archer, a mercenary smuggler searching for a priceless diamond amid the chaos of Sierra Leone's civil war; Hounsou (Gladiator), as a desperate father searching for his lost son; and Connelly (A Beautiful Mind), as a reporter searching for the truth behind the trade in 'conflict diamonds.' Forced to confront the brutal human cost of the diamond trade, Archer changes his search for financial reward to a quest for redemption.
Blood Diamond is a 2006 American political action thriller film directed and co-produced by Edward Zwick and starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Connelly, and Djimon Hounsou. The title refers to blood diamonds, which are diamonds mined in war zones and sold to finance conflicts, and thereby profit warlords and diamond companies around the world.
The film's ending, in which a conference is held concerning blood diamonds, refers to a historic meeting that took place in Kimberley, South Africa, in 2000. It led to development of the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme, which sought to certify the origin of rough diamonds in order to curb the trade in conflict diamonds; the certification scheme has since been mostly abandoned as ineffective.
In 1999, Sierra Leone is ravaged by civil war. The Revolutionary United Front terrorizes the countryside, and enslave many locals to harvest diamonds, which fund their increasingly successful war effort. Solomon Vandy (Djimon Hounsou), a Mende fisherman from Shenge, is separated from his family and assigned to a workforce overseen by Captain Poison (David Harewood), a ruthless warlord.
While mining a river, Vandy discovers an enormous pink diamond. Captain Poison tries to take the stone, but the area is suddenly raided by government troops. Vandy buries the stone before being captured. Vandy and Poison are incarcerated in Freetown along with Danny Archer (Leonardo DiCaprio), a white Rhodesian gunrunner and Border War veteran jailed for trying to smuggle diamonds into Liberia. The diamonds were intended for Rudolph van de Kaap, a corrupt South African mining executive.
Hearing of the pink diamond in prison, Archer arranges for himself and Vandy to be freed. He travels to Cape Town to meet his employer: Colonel Coetzee (Arnold Vosloo), an Afrikaner formerly with the apartheid-era South African Defence Force (whom Archer also served under in the 32 Battallion), who now commands a private military company. Archer wants the diamond so he can sell it to van de Kaap and retire, but Coetzee wants it as compensation for Archer's botched smuggling mission. Archer returns to Sierra Leone, locates Vandy, and offers to help him find his family if he will help recover the diamond.
While Maddy gets out with her story, the two men set out for Captain Poison's encampment. Dia, stationed with the RUF garrison there, is confronted by Vandy, but having been brainwashed he refuses to acknowledge his father. Archer radios the site's coordinates to Coetzee, who directs a combined air and ground assault on the camp. Vandy finds Captain Poison and beats him to death with a shovel as the mercenaries overwhelm the RUF defenders.
Coetzee then forces Vandy to produce the diamond, but is killed by Archer, who realizes Coetzee would eventually kill them both. Dia briefly holds the pair at gunpoint, but Vandy confronts him again and renews their familial bond. Pursued by vengeful mercenaries, Archer discloses he has been mortally wounded and entrusts the stone to Vandy, telling him to take it for his family. Vandy and his son rendezvous with Archer's pilot, who flies them to safety while Archer makes a final phone call to Maddy; they share final farewells as he asks her to assist Vandy, and gives her permission to finish her article. Archer finally takes in the beautiful African landscape before dying.
Vandy arrives in London and meets with a van de Kaap representative; he exchanges the pink diamond for a large sum of money and being reunited with his entire family. Maddy takes photographs of the deal to publish in her article on the diamond trade, exposing van de Kaap's criminal actions. Vandy appears as a guest speaker at a conference on "blood diamonds" in Kimberley, and is met with a standing ovation.
Charles Leavitt was hired by Warner Bros. in February 2004 to rewrite an early draft of the film, then titled Okavango.[4] The story had been stuck in development hell at the studio for years before producers Paula Weinstein and Gillian Gorfil finally decided on the story of an African farmer caught up in the conflict between an American smuggler and the local diamond mining organization.[4] Leavitt researched the diamond industry at great length before he began writing the screenplay, explaining that he has "always been a stickler for immersing [himself] in research".[5] He wrote the film with the assumption that it would offend the diamond industry, particularly De Beers, and so made sure to portray the industry truthfully, aware that he could potentially be sued by De Beers and other powerful mining corporations.[5] Paula Weinstein was impressed by Leavitt's Blood Diamond draft, but hired writers Ed Zwick and Marshall Herskovitz to rewrite it. By the time he had completed the script, Zwick had become so interested in the story that he agreed to direct the film as well.[6]
James Berardinelli of the ReelViews gave the film three out of four stars, saying "It's a solid performance from Leonardo DiCaprio, who has grown into this sort of gritty role and is more believable after having been seen dancing on the dark side in The Departed."[16] Dana Stevens of Slate magazine wrote, "Blood Diamond is a by-the-numbers message picture, to be sure... But the director, Edward Zwick, is craftsman enough that the pace never slackens, the chase scenes thrill, and the battle scenes sicken. And if it makes viewers think twice about buying their sweethearts that hard-won hunk of ice for Christmas, so much the better."[17] Ty Burr of The Boston Globe, after giving the film a positive review, stated: "As an entry in the advocacy-entertainment genre, in which glamorous movie stars bring our attention to the plight of the less fortunate, Blood Diamond is superior to 2003's ridiculous Beyond Borders while looking strident and obvious next to last year's The Constant Gardener.[18]
Pete Vonder Haar of the Film Threat gave the film a mixed review, saying, "It's a reasonably entertaining actioner, and Zwick doesn't shy away from depicting violence or the horrors of war, but as a social statement it falls a little short. And emeralds are prettier anyway."[19] Marc Savlov of The Austin Chronicle also gave the film a mixed review: "While the film never quite reaches the emotional peaks it so obviously seeks to scale, Zwick's film is still potent enough to save you three months salary."[20] Nathan Lee of the Village Voice, like Vonder Haar and Savlov, also gave the film a mixed review, suggesting that "De Beers can relax; the only indignation stirred up by Blood Diamond won't be among those who worry about where their jewelry came from, but with audiences incensed by facile politics and bad storytelling".[21] Scott Tobias of The A.V. Club gave the film a C grade: "Much like Zwick's Glory and The Last Samurai, Blood Diamond strives to be an important film while stopping well short of being genuinely provocative and artistically chancy."[22] Mick LaSalle of the San Francisco Chronicle gave the film a negative review, arguing that "director Edward Zwick tried to make a great movie, but somewhere in the process he forgot to make a good one".[23]
Blood Diamond: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack is the soundtrack to the film of the same name, released on December 19, 2006, by Varse Sarabande. It was composed by James Newton Howard and won the Soundtrack of the Year award at the 2008 Classic Brit Awards.
Blood Diamond was released on DVD in region 1 format on March 20, 2007.[29] Both a single-disc and a two-disc version were released.[30][31] The film has sold an estimated 3.6 million DVD units and has grossed $62.7 million in sales.[29]
Also known as conflict diamonds, blood diamonds are mined in areas operated and guarded by those typically opposed to governments and administrations. The area is often a war zone and the miners (including men, women, and children) are typically forced to toil in terrible conditions.
Blood diamonds come from various countries, most often from those situated on the West Coast of Africa and Southern Africa. During the 20th and 21st-century civil wars, blood diamonds were mined in countries such as the Ivory Coast, Liberia, the Republic of Congo, Zimbabwe, Angola, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, and Sierra Leone. Blood diamonds are mined and then sold by rebel groups to subsidize illegal military action, terrorism, and war efforts. However, creating and running mines is an incredibly expensive proposition. Even large companies like DeBeers can spend upwards of a billion dollars to establish mines. Diamond supply is depleting and so more vigorous mining needs to be done to procure diamonds from deep within the earth. The access to surface-level diamonds, or those available without more intensive mining practices has already been depleted, making it less and less likely that diamonds are tainted with conflict. The barriers of cost make it unlikely that warmongers could resort to diamond trading and mining to fund their violence.
We all love a glamorous gold diamond ring, a pretty diamond necklace, and sparkling diamond earrings, but not if the jewelry contains blood diamonds. In 2003 the Kimberly Process (KP) was brought into force to reduce the flow of conflict diamonds. Made up of industry, civil societies, and administrations, the KP set about the arduous task of stopping conflict diamonds from joining the rough diamond market.
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