The morality of doing "bad" work and becoming a necessary evil

Rating: 8/10 (30 March 2006)

Plot Outline: Lord of War is an intriguing movie about a gunrunner Yuri Orlov (Nicolas Cage) who starts as a nobody and ends as one of the world biggest gunrunners. In the process he becomes an almost immoral person. At the end of the movie he loses everything people value most in their life (his brother gets killed, his wife and parents do not want to know him anymore), but he gains a status of being almost invulnerable.
Below the story: What the deeper story tells is that in this world good and evil often go together in order to achieve a "greater goal" of people or governments. It shows the two sides of the world we live in, one being the good protective world, the other being that of "the ends justify the meaning". As viewer you get reminded that even the governments and companies we trust, sometimes do things that might not be ethically correct but do serve our greater good. Yuri Orlov personates this by becoming immoral, and when knowing his guns will be used to kill hundreds of innocent people he simply states "This is not our war".
Acting and characters: The main characters are all very well made. Most of them represent existing persons or stereotypes of people. Yuri Orlov and Jack Valentine (Ethan Hawke) represent evil and good (Orlov being evil and Valentine being good). During the movie Cage narrates as Orlov, making remarks about good and evil, concluding that "evil prevails". As Orlov and Valentine struggle against each other, Orlov constantly wins. The reason that Valentine does not win is that he does not want to break the law while trying to catch Orlov. He even gets the chance to kill Orlov without getting caught, but he doesn't because ethically he is "too good". Eventually Valentine does get Orlov and good seems to prevail. But by that time Orlov has made himself an almost invulnerable necessary evil, and the status quo decide to let him go free. And so "evil prevails".
Music: The soundtrack is amazing, even hearing the late and amazing Jeff Buckley was breathtaking.
Great movie, one to watch.