Jack of all trades, master of none.

Rating: 6/10 (30 December 2006)

Blood Diamond is the latest in a string of recent Hollywood financed films which have taken on political and social turbulence in Africa and is, in my opinion, the weakest. The script was deeply conflicted about whether the film's main role was as an action film or a political film, and ended up failing as either. The political message, though interesting, was sloppily handled, leading the audience to be angered not by the American and Europeans who control the Diamond business, but by the campy and stereotypical African villains. I felt little pity for the civilian populations, who were made entirely one dimensional and were almost entirely cursory to the main storyline. The exception to this was Honsou, a revelation and easily the highlight of the film. He was compelling to watch, and will hopefully be seen again. DiCaprio wasn't so inspiring. Aside from the fact that he's just too baby-faced to play the tough guys he's been cast as recently, here he was simply dull to watch. Angry, disillusioned and completely lacking in any depth. His chemistry with Connelly was nonexistent. The cinematography was nice enough, but all the action scenes felt overblown and badly handled, and what was really surprising was the complete lack of any feeling of place. There was a village, an urban center, and some fields , and as far as I could tell they were all withing a few miles of each other. All in all, the usual disappointing Hollywood stuff, this time with an important but terribly executed message, made slightly better by one sterling performance. My advice would be to watch the infinitely better and truly touching The Constant Gardener.