Pretty Good, Not Quite Great

Rating: 8/10 (3 December 2006)

For your information, this review contains mild spoilers of the film's storyline.
Blood Diamond had a lot of potential. It had opportunities for action, compelling situations, compelling characters, etc, but it didn't seem to fully realize them.
There were plenty of moments of action, but they seemed to always be filmed with a shaky camera and quick cuts. Sure, that might make it seem more like you're there, but it got pretty old pretty fast. The audience began to not know what was going on or where the main characters were or where the bad guys were. This really subtracted from several scenes that could have been very memorable, like a rebel invasion of Sierra Leone's capital city Freetown.
Much of the movie revolved around the rebel forces of the RUF in Sierra Leone, who kidnapped the son of Solomon Vandy (Djimon Hounsou). Solomon is then taken prisoner by the RUF and forced to dig up diamonds. South African smuggler Danny Archer (DiCaprio, now surely one of the best actors, not only of his generation, but in moviedom today) learns of a diamond worth quite a bit of money that Solomon had found, and most of the movie follows Solomon as he searches for his family and Archer as he searches for the diamond. Archer tells Solomon with the money they could make with the diamond, finding his family would be a breeze, so they stick together. Reporter Maddy Bowen (Jennifer Connelly) hooks up with the pair upon learning of Archer's connections to conflict diamond corporations and their important people. Wanting to really help the victims of the conflict, Maddy helps Solomon and Archer on their quests so that she can get information on the conflict diamond dealers and take them down.
Solomon's son is forced to fight for the RUF, and becomes a completely desensitized, killing machine. This could have been very, very powerful, but it wasn't quite as heart-wrenching as it could have been. It does, however, provide for a great, gut-wrenching moment of tension later in the film. Solomon himself is played well. Hounsou plays him with a sense of innocence, and we do care about him and his journey to find his family. Connelly, too, is an idealistic journalist who wants to help the world, and we come to believe that her well-intentioned motivations are completely genuine. DiCaprio, as always, is terrific. I'm not completely sure what a South African accent should sound like, but his seemed convincing enough to me. He is a man on a mission, and we believe it. It was especially a treat to see his character develop. The best thing about Archer's development is that, while he goes from being selfish to selfless, it's not unbelievable or clichéd. He doesn't just become a good guy, he convincingly transforms from (a closet racist) anti-hero to hero. All around good and great acting in Blood Diamond.
The end concludes with a political message somewhere along the lines of Lord of War, which kind of killed the mood, but it's certainly nice that the movie is actually about something important (i.e. conflict in Africa that, according to Maddy, we might catch on the news somewhere "between sports and weather").
Blood Diamond is done well, but not quite as well as it could have been. Still, it made for a good movie, one of the better of 2006, and I'm glad I saw it.
8/10