Rating of
2.5/4
"Lord Of War" by Yojimbo
Yojimbo - wrote on 04/10/12
Lord Of War stars Nicolas Cage as an arms dealer who happily supplies any and everyone in the world without thought to moral implications; he sees himself purely as a businessman supplying to meet a demand. This initially intriguing premise could've been a biting political satire and comment on the role of the west in the seemingly never-ending military conflicts that flare up around the world. Instead it's a rather half-hearted affair in which there seems to be little in the way of character development, depth of plot or even moral message; the result is a film that resembles a cross between The Last King Of Scotland and Sgt. Bilko. The only attempt to give these factors context on the world stage is a line of text at the end of the film that proclaims that the 5 permanent members of the UN security council are the biggest arms manufacturers in the world. Well, um, duh...But does the film actually explore this fact at all? No, it doesn't. In fact it just contains a few superficially realised characters and an attitude to military hardware that has more in common with The Fast And The Furious than Doctor Strangelove; more often than not it looks like a guns & ammo fetishist's wet dream. It's glossily entertaining for it's duration, but the pay off I was expecting where things turn around and it explores the consequences of his actions never materialises; he just gets shit-faced and stumbles around for a while and then carries on as normal. A reasonable but vacuous way to spend a couple of hours, but I doubt it will stand up to repeat viewing.
