Films That Make You Think...Blood Diamond

So I was lucky enough to attend a few events last week which meant pretty hefty train travel time okay it was only two hours each way but still hefty! Anyways I saw this as a prime example to watch a few films that I've been itching to watch but just haven't had the time to, one of those films was Blood Diamond.
 As a pretty diehard Leonardo Di'caprio fan I was surprised I hadnt managed to see it prior and had been told by a few of my friends that I need to watch it. Before watching the movie I hadnt done any research on it or browsed reviews ( which I'm notorious for doing) because I wanted to really watch the film.

If you haven't seen Blood Diamond I would stop reading right about now...Okay..You ready?

So the movie takes place in 1999 in Sierra Leone where a civil war is taking place between the Government and the rebels who are trying to overthrow the government. To fund their endeavours they capture  men to harvest diamonds, as well as kidnapping children and turning them into child soldiers and forcing them to commit unspeakable acts such as murdering their friends and family.

Amongst everything that is happening Solomon Vandy who is played by the magnificent Djimon Hounsou a fisherman is just trying to live a normal life and works trying to support his family. He has a particularly good bond with his son who he sends to school in the hopes he may become a doctor. When walking his son to school one day the rebels invade his tribe and kidnap him to work as a diamond digger. Thats where he discovers the largest diamond he has ever seen which is pink in colour.
The rebels are invaded by government forces invade the diamond camp and place Solomon and the others in Jail, the leader of the rebels starts asking Solomon where he has hidden the diamond which Solomon denies even having ( but he actually hid it near the diamond camp). This is where Danny Archer ( Leonardo DiCaprio) first hears about the diamond and the story really kicks in. Danny is a diamond smuggler working with the british government. 

Now I'm not going to spoil it to much so I won't go into the whole story because really you should watch it!

The film really got me thinking about certain things such as how until I've seen this movie I how I had never heard about any of these goings on, such as the rebels against the government and the whole child solider element. To me this is the thing that got me think gin the most.

Sure there was the whole Kony thing where people in their drones brought bracelets and changed their Facebook header but that lasted all of 5 minutes and no one really knew why we were doing this apart from the fact all our friends were doing it. Films like blood Diamond and Hotel Rwanda are real eye openers for me and show in illicit detail things which we try to ignore because its not happening to us and this more than anything makes me wonder why!

I try to learn as much as possible about the world around me and it fascinates me that 99% of the things I find out I had never learnt in school or heard about!? Why is this? I love cinema and the thought provoking it creates but when people leave the cinema or press stop why don't people try to make a difference? We have this amazing power in life that we can do something but for some reason we don't seem to learn about important things that are happening around us!


*Blood diamond for me is really thought provoking and a film that kept me gripped until the very end! I you get a chance to watch it please do! And if you can spread the word about the world around us because the topics talked about in this film still occur today! Make a change Make a difference!! *