Blood diamond review

A fisherman, a smuggler, and a syndicate of businessmen match wits over the possession of a priceless diamond. A South African mercenary and a Mende fisherman find their fates forever intertwined as they embark on a quest to obtain a rare and highly coveted pink diamond in director Edward Zwick's frantic adventure drama. Ripped from his family farm and forced to toil away in the sweltering South African diamond fields, Solomon Vandy (Djimon Hounsou) discovered an extraordinary rough stone of immeasurable value.

 

Danny Archer (Leonardo DiCaprio) is a hired gun who specializes in the sale of so-called "blood diamonds" that are used to finance rebellions and terrorist organizations, and is currently serving time for smuggling. As a bloody civil war rages in Sierra Leone and Archer learns that Vandy has safely hidden the diamond in a place where no one would ever suspect, the pair enlist the aid of disillusioned American journalist Maddy Bowen (Jennifer Connelly) in recovering the treasure that has the power to save Vandy's family and provide the desperate Archer with a much-needed chance for redemption.

Blood Diamond is a 2006 American political war thriller film co-produced and directed by Edward Zwick, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Connelly and Djimon Hounsou.[3] The title refers to blood diamonds, which are diamonds mined in African war zones and sold to finance conflicts, and thereby profit warlords and diamond companies across the world.

Set during the Sierra Leone Civil War in 1996–2001, the film shows a country torn apart by the struggle between government soldiers and rebel forces.[4] It also portrays many of the atrocities of that war, including the rebels' amputation of people's hands to discourage them from voting in upcoming elections.

The film's ending, in which a conference is held concerning blood diamonds, is in reference to an actual meeting that took place in Kimberley, South Africa in 2000 and led to the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme, which seeks to certify the origin of rough diamonds in order to curb the trade in conflict diamonds. The film received mixed but generally favorable reviews.