Blood Diamond (2006)

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General		Extras
Category	Adventure	Audio Commentary-Director Edward Zwick Theatrical Trailer Main Menu Audio
Rating
Year Of Production	2006
Running Time	137:26 (Case: 143)
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (68:20)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Language Select Then Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Edward Zwick
Studio Distributor	Virtual Studios Warner Home Video	Starring	Leonardo DiCaprio Djimon Hounsou Jennifer Connelly Kagiso Kuypers Benu Mabhena Anointing Lukola Antony Coleman Arnold Vosloo David Harewood Basil Wallace Jimi Mistry Michael Sheen Marius Weyers
Case	Amaray-Opaque
RPI	$34.95	Music	James Newton Howard

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) Italian Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	2.40:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	2.35:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	Arabic English Hebrew Icelandic Italian English for the Hearing Impaired Italian for the Hearing Impaired	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Is it possible for a film to be both a very worthy comment on the world in which we live and an exciting and entertaining action film? Generally speaking I would have said no, however this film in many ways breaks the mould. It manages to be a searing indictment of man's inhumanity to man and big business' effects on the third world whilst also being a very well made action film with much excitement and excellent stunts. Technically, this film boasts magnificent cinematography by Eduardo Serra, wonderful editing, great sound, a very dramatic score by James Newton Howard and great work by director Edward Zwick.

    The film is set in 1999 in Sierra Leone and focuses on the brutal civil war in that country at the time and the illicit trade in diamonds which both fuelled and funded the war. The film starts with a harrowing scene where a peaceful fishing village is attacked by rebels who are fighting against the government of Sierra Leone. They ruthlessly kill some villagers and then begin cutting off hands with an axe as their logic is that people without hands can't vote for the government. In the village lives a man named Solomon Vandy (Djimon Hounsou whose stunning performance was Oscar nominated) who is captured by the rebels whilst allowing his wife and children to escape. He is taken to work in their diamond mines, the revenue from which they use to fund their war against the government. His wife and children become homeless and travel the countryside trying to avoid the rebels, however, his son, Dia falls into their clutches and they turn him into a child soldier. This horrible practice is very common in African civil wars where children are taught how to use guns and brainwashed into doing whatever they are told. Regularly their first kill is their own parents.

    Meanwhile, Rhodesian ex-mercenary Danny Archer (Leonardo DiCaprio, also Oscar nominated for his excellent work here) is in Sierra Leone dealing in 'conflict' diamonds and gun-running. 'Conflict' diamonds (or Blood Diamonds) are those which come from countries in civil war and are therefore officially shunned by the diamond industry. When Archer is caught smuggling he winds up in a prison with Solomon Vandy. It is here that he hears of Solomon's find of a large pink diamond and decides to 'help' Solomon retrieve it from where he hid it. An uneasy partnership develops between the two with Archer only really interested in the diamond and Solomon only interested in getting his son back and finding his family. Into this mix also comes Maddy Bowen (Jennifer Connelly), a US journalist trying to investigate the 'conflict' diamond trade. She joins their hunt for Solomon's family. Archer's ex-commander, Colonel Coetzee (Arnold Vosloo) is also keen to find the diamond whilst undertaking a mercenary mission to defeat the rebels.

    The acting is of a high standard, especially the two male leads who definitely deserved their Oscar nominations and other awards for their work. The film also received three other nominations for editing, sound editing and sound mixing. It was shot on location mostly in Mozambique, with some extra scenes in Sierra Leone itself and South Africa.

    The tone of the film is quite tense and combines seemingly everyday scenes with surprising and stunning action sequences which feature great sound effects and wonderful camera work. Some of the film is quite harrowing but the violence is never gratuitous. To some degree the diamond involved is a bit of a Macguffin with the theme of child soldiers being the one which sticks longest and most firmly in the mind and certainly drives the actions of Solomon.

    An excellent modern film which seamlessly combines important politics and themes with a high quality action film. Bravo!

Video

    The video quality is excellent, leaving very little for a DVD reviewer to comment on.

    The feature is presented in a 2.40:1 aspect ratio, 16x9 enhanced, which is very close to the original aspect ratio of 2.35:1.

    The picture was very sharp and clear with excellent detail throughout. There was no evidence of low level noise. Shadow detail was excellent.

    The colour was stunning, wonderfully representing the colours of Africa.

    The only artefact I noticed was some very mild aliasing on a truck grille at 12:18.

    There are subtitles in 5 languages including English and English for the Hearing Impaired. An automatic subtitle stream is included for captions such as place names which would have been burned into the prints shown in cinemas. The subtitle streams themselves were easy to read and seemed exact to the spoken word.

    The layer change occurs at 68:20 and was not noticeable during playback. Bizarrely, the case indicates this disc is single layer.
    

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    The audio quality is very good but a less than optimal bitrate does not quite do justice to the Oscar nominated sound work.

    This DVD contains an English Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack encoded at 384 Kb/s and the same in Italian. It seems quite weird (and a tad annoying) to encode a brand new film with such wonderful sound design at less than the optimum 448 Kb/s for an SD DVD.

    Dialogue was clear and easy to understand and there was no problem with audio sync. Some accents made some lines of dialogue hard to decipher but that is not the fault of the transfer.

    The score by James Newton Howard is very dramatic and extremely well suited to the film.

    The surround speakers were very well used for gun battles, aeroplanes and explosions. A jail scene included some excellent use of surround to give you the sense of claustrophobia which would have greeted new inmates. I can't help but feel that this surround usage would have benefited even more from a full bitrate transfer.

    The subwoofer was also very well used for explosions, the music and additional tension.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

    This movie has been released in both a single disc version and a two disc special edition. I was provided with a copy of the single disc version for review. The two disc version contains additional extras but I do not have confirmed details of those. I believe it contains an highly regarded 50 minute documentary about the blood diamond trade along with a variety of making of featurettes.

Menu

    The menu was fairly ordinary, being still but including music from the score. It was simple but functional.

Commentary - Director, Edward Zwick

    This is one of the best commentaries I have heard recently. Zwick is interesting, informative and keeps the commentary flowing without resorting to describing onscreen action. He covers the story, locations, visual effects, shooting issues, building the location sets, various technical information and the cast. He also discusses the issues which the film raises and tells some anecdotes and stories. Definitely worth your time.

Theatrical Trailer (1:57)

    This is the UK theatrical trailer.

    The 1 disc version is the same globally except that the Region 1 disc contains Spanish & French dubs as opposed to our Italian dub here. Draw.

    The video quality is excellent.

    The audio quality is very good but not at the optimal bitrate.

    This one-disc version contains a high quality audio commentary plus the trailer. A two-disc version is available.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall