Films That You Should Have Watched Yesterday - Blood Diamond (2006)

    Lekker Story, Bru: The Fight for Fulfilment in the Mad World 

          While sat comfortably on a candy-red double decker bus, cruising alongside beaches comprised of vanilla-shaded sand gently massaged by tranquil sapphire-blue water prompts the audio commentary provided for the sightseeing tour of Cape Town, South Africa, to proudly assert that here lies one of the prime filming locations for major Hollywood blockbusters, such as Invictus, Black Sails and Blood Diamond. Even a decade later, the tourism industry insists that visitors are made aware that Cape Town, recently voted the second best beach city in the world by National Geographic, played an integral role in these productions, providing one of the beautiful backdrops for which there was no substitute anywhere else on the African continent. Temptation suggests that hearing movie titles, which are accurate but nonetheless far from current, highlights that the tourist information is in desperate need of an update. Such thoughts are hastily buried deep, however, once the didactic, Oscar-tipped political war thriller, positioned at the end of the aforementioned list, is finally watched. Even if only a few seconds of screen time were dedicated to the seaside of the Western Cape, pride in South Africa's role for the film spawns from all of the building blocks that the nation provided in aid of telling a superb story, which lingers in heart and mind for years afterwards, not just because so few Hollywood features dare to be set in Africa, but also due to the fact that Blood Diamond exposes numerous real world instances of both the pain masked behind the pleasure and vice versa. The mind-numbing scale of these contrasts had heretofore, at least in public, been unappreciated and often outright denied with striking persistence. Now, after watching this movie, they will all at least never be entirely forgotten.      

Diamonds Are for Nothing - Ostensibly incurable corruptions in society are exposed in Blood Diamond, most notably the belief, entrenched deep in the minds of the tyrannous majority by the unquestioned and unchecked powerful business-minded, who are motivated by greed under the guise of aid, forever asserting that materialism and money are the keys to uncovering the true and eternal happiness within. The tragedy is that, after having been allowed to be declared through posters and television sets for decades, these beliefs are so engrained that to be permanently relieved of them seems impossible. Thus, individuals are left to justify their unwillingness to change with morally false, unfocused attempts at minimising the inevitable collateral damage caused by their selfish pursuits of what they want. For example, is an expensive diamond ring really the best way to show and make a permanent record of romantic love? Even in spite of the costs, both hidden and visible? Will that diamond make loneliness history for those who employ it the way that society deems necessary? For now, few dare to risk tainting the love in question with potentially crippling guilt by suggesting otherwise.         

          Leonardo DiCaprio lost out on an Oscar winner's recognition of artistic prowess for the third time following his role in Blood Diamond, during an awards season in which even veteran critics couldn't pick a winner between his performance as the Zimbabwean smuggler, Danny Archer, and a portrayal of an American undercover cop in Martin Scosese's highly acclaimed winner of four Oscars, The Departed. As a bizarre and frankly unfair consequence, DiCaprio was granted two of the four Golden Globe nominations available for the trophy given to the best actor of the year in a drama picture. A sadistic knife twist in the heart in the form of a laughable and cruel arrangement of events followed when DiCaprio returned home after that particular ceremony in 2007 with neither part being crowned the winner. Yes. There is no denying that his attempt at the South African accent was far from flawless. Yet, after forgiving a handful of ear-tickling mistakes occurring as early as his first scene in the film, DiCaprio does eventually becomes more consistent, which many fail to notice after refusing to forgive him for his initial clumsy pronunciations. However, this error alone cannot justify the actor's denial of Oscar victory or that his performance remains as priceless as the diamonds around which the movie is centred. Throughout Archer's dialogue there are instances of appropriate South African-isms. Some of these come in the from of not just familiar words but also entire lines of dialogue that DiCaprio himself improvised in the midst of of filming, courtesy of thorough research into how a character originating from Zimbabwe and for a time living in South Africa might speak and behave. The greatest quality brought to Danny Archer, however, through expert mannerisms, facial expressions and particularly impressive employment of the eyes, is a determination to present and maintain a tough, life-hardened personality. One that defiantly guards the deeper, more fragile core of the character that is urgently seeking peace and stability, hoping also to heal the painful void of loneliness growing ever greater with each setback or miscalculation that he encounters. As the audience watches the tears reluctantly emerge from Archer's worn, tortured eyes, they are reminded that love, at its purest, is not present in money or sex for instance but genuine, selfless offerings of kindness. Offerings of which all are worthy of receiving from everyone else, regardless of ties of family or blood any other more artificial threads that people employ to connect each another in exclusive clubs founded ultimately in their imaginations. Thus, Blood Diamond to this day serves as a reminder that Leonardo DiCaprio, for creating a great character and playing a leading role in the crafting of fine storytelling, filled with action, emotion, suspense and powerful lessons, should have, without question, won an Academy Award for acting a long time ago.  

Everyone's a (Worthy) Winner - An infinite amount of credit is due for DiCaprio, not least because here was a role through which he finally proved to the world that he could play more mature roles that were far removed from the 'teenage boy' image that was for a time forced upon him after the immense success of his breakthrough part in Titanic. Media channels have speculated that he turned down roles in Spider Man and Star Wars in order to avoid being forever pigeon-holed by Hollywood. More recent performances in The Wolf of Wall Street and The Revenant suggest that his determination to succeed as a great actor have paid off, albeit not evidenced by an Oscar win. Incidentally, Djimon Hounsou and Jennifer Connelly also perform admirably. Audiences will no doubt remember Hounsou from another awesome sidekick role in Gladiator, in cinemas over a decade prior to this movie. Hounsou has also endured similar bad luck at the Academy Awards to his parter in crime for Blood Diamond. The fact that Connelly was not nominated for an award as a result of this particular film would not bother most, since she had already made her noteworthy talent clear after winning an Oscar for her role in A Beautiful Mind. Of course a film's success must not be defined solely by the number of awards that it wins but the fact that this film walked away without any of them does not mean that such awards were any less well-deserved.     

          Cape Town remains a popular location for film-makers. Thus, in time, the contribution that Blood Diamond made to the economy there may become overshadowed by future productions. For now though, it is one of the few places in which the movie does not feel grossly under-appreciated. Blood Diamond is a film for which all of the puzzle pieces, whether it be the beautifully soul-motivating orchestral score by James Newton Howard, the gorgeous cinematography capturing the more pleasant side of Africa, or the imperfect but nonetheless impressive acting witnessed on-screen, fit together perfectly, with Edward Zwick at the helm, to highlight a handful of hard truths through a genuinely worthwhile story. The result was one of the best cinematic experiences of the decade.