What do we really do when we acquire them?Here are some of the questions we ask ourselves after watching the film Blood Diamond (Edward Zwick, 2006). A film full of emotions, violence, adventure and with a critical component that doesn’t happen. Unnoticed.
The film revolves around a true story: the civil war in Sierra Leone and the diamond trade, which serve as the setting for what we are witnessing. But Blood Diamond isn’t just about war, it’s about creating a new adventure story in which two characters, from different worlds, become allies.
- Danny Archer and Solomon Vandy come together to get a diamond that can change their lives.
- Albeit in a very different way.
- Solomon’s life collapsed with the advent of war.
- When The Rebels of the United Revolutionary Front invaded his village and destroyed families.
- Including his.
Solomon is recruited by the FRU to look for diamonds. These diamonds are intended for the FRU to finance war and acquire weapons. Solomon’s family manages to escape, although his son Dia is captured and turned into a child soldier. In addition to Solomon, we see Danny Archer, a white man who is engaged in diamond smuggling. The roads of the two cross in jail. In this, Archer learns that Vandy has found a huge pink diamond, so he’s trying to get Solomon out of jail and get the diamond.
The film, of great cruelty, contains tremendously violent and tragic scenes, manages to capture pain, helplessness in such a difficult situation and make us partakers of something that the West prefers not to see.
As a personal recommendation, it is interesting to see the film in its original language, so as not to miss the nuances of the magnificent performances of its two protagonists: Djimon Hounsou and Leonardo DiCaprio, who made an exceptional accent change that can only be appreciated. In their dubbed version, the two characters represent the two sides of survival in a world where corruption, injustice, slavery and violence are the protagonists.
The main duo is joined by an American journalist, Maddy Bowen, a young idealist who characterizes Western society very well, sometimes we tend to think that we can change the world, that by contributing our grain of sand we can make small changes in although this claim is not entirely false, the truth is that when we enter the darkest part of humanity , this positivism tends to disappear.
Being in the West, we sometimes forget that the world is not as easy as we think, that it is not a perfect place where we can achieve everything we set out to do, it is true that we are not far from corruption or violence, but there are countless problems that we are not aware of but in which we participate. In a way, the media fosters this vision; just look at the information to see the different treatments given to the same tragedy, depending on where it happened in the world.
If the tragic event occurs in Europe, the media moves us and devotes a lot of time to the news, however, if it happens on the other side of the world, it is no more than five minutes and it treats it more superficially. Are we really aware of the situation beyond our borders?That’s one of the questions we ask ourselves when we meet Maddy Bowen.
Maddy is a true reflection of Westerners who believe they can change the world, it is a reflection of their ideals and power, yet these ideals are of little use in an environment where survival is the most important thing. Surviving anyway, escaping or fighting in a hostile world, to which Vandy and Archer are more than used to and contrasts with Maddy’s idea.
Maddy believes that if he makes a good story, he can raise awareness or at least involve them and stop looking elsewhere for Sierra Leone’s dramatic situation. The problem is that good intentions are sometimes not enough. One can question Archer’s attitude, the fact, that is enriched at the expense of the suffering of others. However, we realize that this is his way of survival, that all he wants is to be able to flee the continent.
Vandy, in turn, represents the values of the family. His love for her leads him to risk his own life by hiding the precious diamond. Vandy could have put the diamond back on and continue his slavery by lowering his head. However, he decides, to try his luck and do whatever it takes to find his family. Despite the values embodied by these characters, despite the questionable attitudes they may present, including Archer, he will soon realize that the enemy is nothing more than power, corruption and, in a way, consumers themselves.
Blood Diamond goes beyond the representation of good and evil, it goes beyond the characters themselves, what the film really proposes is a reflection on the world in which we live, about the inequalities and consumptions in which we are involved. themselves who buy the jewels of exploration and, in doing so, end up financing the WEAPONS of the FRU and turning the children into soldiers, as happened with Dia.
At the same time, the three characters somehow represent this circle of interests: Maddy comes from the West, from consumer society, from those people who buy diamonds finance weapons; Archer is the intermediary between the two continents, responsible for the sale of diamonds; and Solomon, who belongs to the world of slavery, to whom they must seek diamonds that will then be sold and bought by a rich Westerner.
So what the film shows us is how these characters act according to their reality, their context, each of them faces their individual situation as they see it best, crossing their paths, embarking on a journey of adventure, survival and dramatic situations. A countercurrent path, David’s struggle against Goliath, in which the precious diamond will be the reward and, although it seems contradictory, the path to freedom.
After seeing Blood Diamond, we encounter endless doubts about our own role as in bold or unsy daring consumers. Do we really know if our most precious objects are not stained with blood?And we’re no longer talking about precious jewelry, like diamonds, but simple, everyday objects like clothing, food and technology.
Is it fair to pay an exorbitant price for an item?, are we victims of the time and the place where we were born ?, is it in our hands to make a difference?Blood Diamond opens the debate, presents us with a raw and violent reality, brings us together perfectly represented characters, with different lives and dreams, but with one goal: to survive in a hostile world.
“Who do you think buys the stones I smuggled?American girls who want a dream wedding and a stone like the ones they advertise in their politically correct magazines?. – Blood Diamond-“