I've been meaning to write about the film blood diamond... because after hearing that it was such a great film that I had to see I must say I was extremely, extremely disappointed. Not only by the storytelling, which is quite pretentious but also because of the problematic white and black relationship the main two characters have. I have been looking for words but this review From: San Diego State University says it all. Read it.

Blood Diamond

December 9th, 2006 by Beth Accomando

Edward Zwick's Blood Diamond.

Blood Diamond presents itself as an action thriller but the genre trappings can't hide the fact that Zwick wants to teach audiences another history lesson and lecture them on political correctness. Jennifer Connelly's reporter exists only to spout statistics and educate us on the subject. She's like one of those characters you bump into in a video game that spews information so you can advance to the next level. When Archer first meets Bowen, their conversation is a rapid summary of recent African history with snide comments about American guilt and the fact that the politically correct way to refer to Rhodesia now is to call it Zimbabwe. Similarly, Vandy is meant to be symbolic of the African people. But none of these people feel like fully fleshed out characters.

Edward Zwick directs Leonardo DiCaprio and Djimon Hounsou.

Zwick is not content to just tell a good action story or to focus tightly on one aspect of a complex problem—he wants to explore everything. He shows how the guerrillas coerce children into fighting, how diamonds fund the violence, how the west ignores the problems in Africa, the formation of massive refugee camps, and so on. Yet even though the film covers a lot of ground, it never gets to the complexity of the problems. It's broad in scope but not deep.

A film that did manage to blend politics and good storytelling together was last year's The Constant Gardener, a thriller that enlightened us about Africa while also delivering a compelling and tense narrative. That film found a clever way to weave the character's journey neatly and tightly into the themes of social injustice in Africa so that the audience got an education without being hit over the head with a message. The Constant Gardener riveted viewers with the characters and their emotional journey first and then worked on enlightening us with its themes.

Blood Diamond

Zwick, however, is not as graceful in weaving his tale. Plus, he hurts the film by not giving equal weight to the two male characters. Zwick appears to make the odd assertion that the white characters have more emotional investment in and ownership of Africa than the blacks. Archer is told by another white mercenary that the dirt in Africa is red because it is soaked with their blood, and that they can never leave the country because Africa runs through their veins. Archer then gets to bleed into the African soil and essentially proclaim it as his country. But it's also Vandy's country. Yet the film makes less of an effort to point out the amount of black African blood split on the same soil. Another scene that plays falsely is when Vandy wonders aloud if his country might not have been better off when it were ruled by whites. Maybe, he suggest, the blacks just have something bad within them. Such a comment seems ill placed. After all it was white colonials who created some of the divisions that still haunt the continent today. And while Zwick promotes political correctness, he never really allows Vandy's character the same chance as Archer's to speak out. When Vandy does have a moment when is supposed to speak about the pain and suffering of his country, that's the moment when Zwick brings up the music and pulls away so that the voice he claims is the most important one for us to hear, the one we are urged not to ignore, is in essence silenced.

This year, DiCaprio makes an earnest bid to change from pretty boy to tough guy with his dual roles as the hard edged undercover cop in The Departed and the mercenary with shifting morals here in Blood Diamond. He's a talented actor and the harder edge is a nice change of pace. Hounsou's Vandy is made subordinate to DiCaprio's Archer and that's too bad. Hounsou is a forceful actor and he should have been given more to work with. Connolly serves merely as a pretty plot device.

A recent film that did convey a better sense of the African experience is Catch a Fire. But that film came and went in a week. It was a more provocative film in that it explored how the injustices suffered by one black man politicized him enough to make him take action and join a resistance movement that used violence. He's labeled a terrorist by the white government. That film at least tried to convey an African point of view even though it was also made by a white filmmaker. Films from Africa, made by African filmmakers are few and of those few only a rare one ever makes it to American theater screens. All the films we've seen recently of Africa—Blood Diamond, Catch a Fire, The Constant Gardener, Biko, The Last King of Scotland, Tears of the Sun—are all very western in terms of their narrative structure. Films from Africa by such directors as Sembene Ousmane or Djibril Diop Mambety have a very different storytelling quality to them that stems from an oral storytelling tradition. It would be nice to see more films from a genuinely African perspective make it to American theaters.

Blood Diamond (rated R for strong violence and language) ends with the request that people demand that the trade in blood diamonds stop. But this call to action is simplistic and naive. It's not like The Inconvenient Truth asking us to buy smaller cars, drive less and use public transportation—all things we can easily and actually accomplish. Diamonds don't come with their origins engraved on the back. So for the film to lay out its case and simply say it's in your power to stop the trade in blood diamonds is a smug way for Zwick to feel like he's accomplished something when he hasn't. He's really just nicked the surface of a much bigger and more complex issue. In the end, Zwick's film just feels like another attempt at alleviating white guilt.

 

Thank you Beth Accomando.

Just saw the film Babel a few days ago by Alejandro Gonzalez
Inarritu - known for previous films such as 21 grams and Amores perros.
He is a wonderful filmmaker and has this "special touch", that little
something that makes you think long after you come out of the cinema
about what you've seen. I really liked the different stories that all
have something to say about the society we live in, and actually how it
is not at all working like it should.



Especially I found the vision of the role of the media in modern
society acurate. How the media sometimes distorts reality - not
knowingly perhaps but just in that constant hastyness. With new
technologies and people having less and less time to accord to one
media, since there are so many available, we are in constant
competition - just to get someone to watch (or read, or listen).
Information has to be available right now, at all times, everywhere.
This automatically generates less accurate information getting out,
which often than not has not been verified properly. And it is very
easy to make mistakes - since you have to be the first to inform (CNN's
slogan is "be the first to know" while BBC goes with "the most trusted
name in news"). Sadly, its not enough to have a nice slogan, when most
of these channels operate in the same way, it is hard to believe that
all that is getting trough is the truth, and nothing but the truth.
Without even trying to go into what "truth" really means. There are
often many truths in one story.

I'm so glad films like that are still made, and that people actually go and see them.

Im clearly not up to the challenge on my blog, thats for sure.
Promissed I wouldn't favoure myspace over it but life takes you
sometimes where you don't want to go.. haha.. as if this was something
out of my control. Right.

Had a few days off work which is
great because I needed to sort my head a bit and I think the little
cocktail on Friday was a fantastic idea to boost the moral of the
troops. I wont lie to you, these past few weeks in training (where we
are supposed to work as if we were in realtime broadcasting) have been
tough. It takes time to get the system going and people to take in
certain automatisms (if that even is a word! I get my french and
english so mixed up, since every one at work speaks both languages and
sometimes at the same time) But we are getting there. Slowly but
surely. And the big day has been set: the 6th of december we are on air
("are you online, Ive been waiting for a sign") and then we will be
accessable to the whole world. Thats going to be something.

Ok I
had another excuse as well since old friends came for a few days and
stayed with me, and it was great to see them. Its weird how I can be
organised at work but completely out of it in my personal relations.
Forget to call people and always, always be late for rendez-vous. Thank
god for those patient friends who take matter into their own hands -
that just come around and make things easier. I have to try to be less
in my own little personal space and just get out there. Go to St
petersbourg or New York on a whim. Well actually I am on my way to
Iceland for a couple of days.. and that is going to be awesome. Can't
wait to see everyone, eat "Nammi" and lots of, lots of fish. its good
for you, you know.

The cirkus show Les Arts Sauts 

 

Wondering what to write... these thoughts are flying through my mind...

I could try to explain the time when Michael decided to have grief councelling at the office because he found out that his former boss had died. He completely freaked out when he found out that a bird had crashed into the window and wanted to have a formal funeral. HILAROUS  but of course that only happened in the tv series "the office", not in my beautiful workplace. (the one where all the women are marilyns)

Or detail a beautiful cirkus show I saw last week... Les arts Sauts .. an acrobatic performance simply majestic with breathtaking jumps, sensuality, cries and laughter but it is just one of those moments where you had to be there.

Cannot help but admire the baby- booming people I met recently - their enthusiasm and how their choices in life seem so effortless and right. How age is totally irrelevent when you know where you are heading - Not that I am in an enormous decision-making episode of my life right now. My life seems pretty set, with a good job (some days being better than others, especially those where I realise I am totally capable of doing it) and a homy appartment. I even have the luxury of meeting new interesting people and having good friends dropping by regularly. Without forgetting the pretty faces around me every day. What would I do without them... the fashion-conscious and -unconscious ones are the most fun - and sometimes I wonder whether I might perhaps be a bit too obsessed with dress-codes. But coming from Iceland I think that is just to be expected. Halló... if it makes me happy I don't see where the problem is - right Justin?

And its not like I am ill advised either, like my personal counsultant always says: Its good that you work hard but don't forget your feelings. Thank you "mamie".   

yes I have one; french internet companies take AGES to connect you to the free world! Oh men ... not only that but last week I wrote two blogentries, very detailed including all my dirty little secrets and somehow - pfuff - like by accident these entries didn't show and disappeared into the mystery of the net.

Oh well...guess you didn't want to know my secrets after all.

Work is ..... ohhh lets not talk about that

I am so pleased in my sweet little appartment although I have already had one unpleasent encounter with one of the next door neighbours. Not the cute old lady that finishes all her sentences by "you are such a charming young girl" or the military guy that is not a day older than 18 and comes back to his starving cat every evening. No- this is the man living under me (Ross to Rachel: "over me, over me??!! When were you under me?") anyway; no not that kind of under me.. he lives on the sixth floor and apparently my little feet disturb him terribly. He hasn't slept in a week because I walk barefoot into the kitchen and have a glass a water after midnight!!! Poor guy... He's going to be real happy when I start my nightshifts...