Lord of War is a 2005 political crime thriller written and directed by Andrew Niccol which stars Nicolas Cage. It was released in the United States on September 16, 2005, with the DVD following on January 17, 2006 and the Blu-ray Disc on July 27, 2006. Cage plays an illegal arms dealer with similarities to Russian arms dealers Viktor Bout[1][2][3] and Leonid Minin. The film was officially endorsed by the human rights group Amnesty International for highlighting the trafficking of weapons by the international arms industry.[4][5]
Plot
The film begins with Yuri Orlov, a Ukrainian-American gunrunner, (Nicolas Cage) standing in a sea of spent shell casings. The rest of the movie is told in flashback, starting in 1982 and ending in the completion of the opening scene.
Through voice-over, Orlov describes the beginnings of his career. After he sees a Russian mobster kill two would-be assassins, he decides to fulfill a necessity by providing guns. He partners up with his brother Vitaly Orlov (Jared Leto). Yuri's first break comes during the 1982 Lebanon War, when he sells guns to all sides of the conflict.
As his business grows, Yuri (through voiceover) tells of his first incident with Jack Valentine (Ethan Hawke), an Interpol agent who cannot be bought with money. Yuri avoids arrest when he changes his boat's name from the Kristol to the Kono and confuses Valentine.
During a business deal with a Colombian drug lord, Yuri is paid in cocaine instead of cash. The contact refuses to pay him anything else and Yuri is forced to accept it. Vitaly and he both get high, but Vitaly becomes addicted, and Yuri checks him into a rehabilitation center. From that point onward, he conducts his arms business alone. Soon after this incident, he courts and marries model Ava Fontaine (Bridget Moynahan) and they have a child named Nikolai.
Yuri gets his second break after the Soviet Union dissolves. Yuri rushes to Ukraine after watching Mikhail Gorbachev's Christmas Day 1991 speech of resignation on television. He begins buying tanks and other weapons to expand his operations.
One day, Valentine reveals to Ava that Yuri is an arms dealer. Ava convinces him to stop dealing and he complies for a short while. He is lured back in when his old friend, the dictator of Liberia (Andre Baptiste), approaches him and offers him more money. Yuri brings Vitaly along due to nervousness. During the transaction, Vitaly sees a group of villagers beat a woman and her child to death and tries to convince Yuri to stop the transaction. When Yuri refuses, Vitaly takes a grenade and blows up half the gun shipment. A few nearby soldiers immediately kill Vitaly.
Back at home, Valentine follows Ava as she finds Yuri's security container. She and Yuri's parents disown him, and Valentine arrests him. However, Yuri tells Valentine that his superiors at Interpol will not allow him to be arrested, as he has positioned himself as a "necessary evil", who is able to distribute weapons when first-world governments do not want to become directly involved. This proves to be true, and Yuri is released to return to his business. A brief postscript notes that the five largest arms exporters – the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia, France, and China – are also the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council.
Cast
Music
Opening sequence is filmed on the song "For What It's Worth" by Buffalo Springfield.
DVD release
The UK DVD release of Lord of War includes, prior to the film, an advert for Amnesty International, showing the AK-47 being sold on a shopping channel of the style popular on cable networks. The American DVD release includes a bonus feature that shows the various weapons used in the movie, allowing viewers to click on each weapon to get statistics about their physical dimensions and histories.
Reception
Critical
The film received a 61% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and it also received a special mention for excellence in film making from the National Board of Review.
Box office
The film grossed $9,390,144 on its opening weekend (2,814 theaters, $3,336 average). After the film's 7-weeks release it grossed a total of $24,149,632 on the domestic market in the US, and $48,467,436 overseas.[6]
See also
- War zones featured
References
External links
