Lord of War

Every once in a blue moon, Nic Cage comes out with something that isn't total crap and isn't just there to make me laugh my ass off. Believe it or not, the guy is at least a little bit of a talented actor and at times, he can make you feel something with a good performance. And at times, he can choose a good movie to be in.

While I don't think Lord of War is his best film, Lord of War is a pretty good film in a long line of awful Nic Cage movies.

The movie begins by introducing the main character, Yuri Orlov (played by Cage). Orlov is a Ukrainian immigrant who came to the United States when he was young. He had a tough upbringing and just wanted to be successful. He has a brother named Vitaly (played by Jared Leto) and one day he figures out the best way to make that success and he becomes interested in illegal arms dealing.

And the majority of the movie is his rags to riches story. He goes from a nobody in New York to one of the biggest illegal arms dealers in the world. Along the way his brother picks up a cocaine addiction, he cons his way into making the girl of his dreams (played by Bridget Moynahan) fall in love with him and marry him, he starts an arms war with a rival dealer (played Ian Holm) and all the while the major events of the world give him opportunities to become an incredibly rich man off the selling weapons of death while he's being trailed by an Interpol agent (played by Ethan Hawke).

That's a pretty brief description of a movie that a lot happens in.

The movie parallels itself with the events of the Cold War and that's how he begins his business. But he really hits his break when the Cold War ends and the countries that used to be under the umbrella of the Soviet Union are now their own countries and need to disarm but don't have much oversight while they're doing it.

The fun parts of this movie is when they explain how Yuri is able to maneuver around the laws and regulations to keep his business afloat and keep him from going to jail.

There's several scenes where his paths cross with Ethan Hawke's and he's able to make it seem like he's totally innocent. And since Ethan Hawke is suppose to be the good guy in all normal stories, he doesn't go outside the law to bring Yuri to justice. Yuri is able to maneuver around that and make sure that he's able to continue business and not go to prison.

When the Cold War ends, a lot of the weapons he begins selling start heading to Africa and he starts arming the conflicts out in Africa.

Now, I enjoyed a lot of this movie, I enjoyed the different directions it took and I like the historical context behind it. However, what I didn't like was the representation of Africa in this movie.

I wish there was a correct way to describe how surreal this movie gets when he gets to Africa. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure a lot of this stuff is accurate, I'm sure African warlords were and are pretty fucked up guys who created this seemingly lawless state that Nicolas Cage travels to.

But the Africa they go to is some weird video game version of Africa with groupies in Dallas Cowboy Cheerleader uniforms and guys with golden AK-47s. Again, I'm sure some of it is accurate, but the way it was portrayed reminded me more of a video game than it did real life. And that's unfortunate because up until that point, the movie had a pretty realistic feeling to it. And granted, some of the most surreal moments of this movie is when he's on drugs, but a lot of the scenes he's stone cold sober and the countries in Africa he goes to are these lawless, nothing but warlord ridden countries and that's not how every country in Africa is.

The end of the second act of this movie got weird, lets just say that.

But again, there is a lot that this movie has going for it. When he's making his deals, the movie gets exciting. When he's avoiding the law, this movie gets exciting. When he detaches himself from what his profession is doing to innocent people, the movie gets complex and I like it.

The issue that comes up is when the movie gets a little bit preachy.

I'll talk more about his wife in a little bit, but there's a point where she confronts him about his line of work and instead of the careful line the movie had been balancing on throughout where Cage was kind of in a grey area of morality and it was up to the audience to figure out if what he was doing is right or wrong, they just come out and yell it in our face, "What he's doing is wrong!" There's no debate, no question about the merits of both arguments, the movie just flat out says, Arms dealing is wrong.

And I don't want to get into the politics, the differing sides of this argument, but there's a great part where Yuri is having this monologue and he says there's three kinds of arms dealing, white = legal, black = illegal, and his personal favorite, grey. Regardless of what your personal opinions on weapons trading, there is a certain amount of grey area that was in this movie and then it just kind of says, nope, everything here is wrong.

Now I did think that the message of the United States involvement in weapons trafficking that they kind of tag onto the end was a pretty good message, even though it was really just slapped onto the end kind of haphazardly. That should have been the message they were pulling for more. Saying, here's this business that people profit off, are you okay with the fact that innocent people die because of this business? Are you okay that the US government is involved with it? The movie should have been more of a thought provoking film instead of shoving a message down our throats.

But what you think of the message is really up to your preference so I would suggest seeing the movie if you have any interest in weapons trafficking. Let's talk about performances.

Believe it or not, this is actually (in my opinion) probably one of Cage's best performances. Don't get me wrong, he still has his Cage moments where he's over the top, but those moments are very well picked out that it almost feels normal and makes sense with his character. Otherwise, its a pretty subdued performance and Cage actually executes it very well.

The great part about this performance is that he does both the lives of weapons dealer and family man and the duality is great. There's not too many times that I think Nicolas Cage is the perfect role for a movie but this might be the closest I have ever gotten to thinking that. It really is a good performance and if more of his performances were like this one, Cage wouldn't be a running joke like he is. Do I say that with any kind of regret that he's not a running joke, oh gawd no, I love Cage just the way he is, but its good to see these rare good performances by him every once in a while.

Now quick, I need something to remind of the iconic Cage as opposed to the good actor Cage...

Ahh... That's better.

I wanna talk about Ian Holm and Ethan Hawke before I talk about the other performances.

First off, this movie makes me want to see Ian Holm in more stuff. All I really know him from is old Bilbo from Lord of the Rings. The relationship him and Cage form in this movie is actually really interesting and I would have liked to see more of him in this film and had him be a bigger role. If the movie had focused more on their rivalry as opposed to the trippy parts of Cage's time in Africa, I think I would have enjoyed the movie a lot more than I already did.

But Holm gives a good performance just making me want more.

Ethan Hawke... I mean it was good.

I in no way think Ethan Hawke is a bad actor. I actually want to see him in more things because I don't get enough of his acting to convince myself that he's good or not. The problem is, like Holm (and a lot of performances in this movie) I don't feel like I got enough. The movie is so focused on Cage, and while I think that was a good thing, you'd get characters like Hawke or Holm who would just show up. They'd have their personality set up by one scene and they'd just play a single note as an obstacle to Cage's life. And while they were entertaining and I wanted to see more, there's not much to their characters.

Hawke is a by the book cop (Interpol doesn't really work the way it does in this movie but who cares). He's not willing to compromise his values to get the job done and he disagrees with Cage's line of work on moral grounds. Holm is a rival arms dealer. He is willing to go to any lengths to beat out Cage and he has a different set of values when it comes to arms dealing. They never go into what forms those beliefs, they're just different. Interesting characters sure, but not developed enough to make me care and really enjoy the performances like I think I was suppose to.

But then we get into the people really worth talking about, Bridget Moynahan and Jared Leto.

The first visual we get of Moynahan really should sum up her character, pretty, but superficial.

And that's not me saying that about all women who do pageants or make careers off their looks, the movie goes out of their way to make this girl pretty superficial.

And it would have been okay if she had had some big change of heart or had gone through some kind of development that get the perception that she's just the superficial trophy wife out of my head. But since that perception stayed throughout the entire movie, when she tried to be a better character, it didn't really make a lot of sense. And again, its kind of a matter of this movie focusing a lot on Nicolas Cage's character. The movie was so invested in Cage and his development that it didn't really give her enough time to be developed and be a more interesting character. And sometimes you can still get that development across if you're a good actor, but I'm not gonna sugar coat this, Bridget Moynahan does not impress me. And I was gonna say that I've only seen her in a couple movies, but the truth is, she's been in a lot. She was in The Recruit, she was in I Robot, she was in John Wick and The Sum of All Fears. She's been in a lot and she hasn't impressed me in any of it. Maybe I should watch Blue Bloods, but still, she's just not that great of an actress.

Now Moynahan is one thing but what about Leto?

Once again, the movie really pulls away from the other actors and really focuses in on Cage. And that does take away from the performance and presence of Leto in this film. I've only seen a few of his movies but Leto continues to really make an impression of an incredibly talented actor. And that is a strength about him, while he's being pushed to the sidelines until they need him again to make way for Cage, Leto still does a pretty good job in this film.

The other issue I have with Leto's role in this movie is that the beginning makes for a very interesting premise. You've got two immigrants who are brothers who decide to get into the arms dealing business. Cage is the businessman while Leto is the muscle and his backup. Along the way, Leto's character gets a cocaine addiction. It could have made for a really interesting dynamic between these business partner brothers. But no, they just push Leto away to rehab and the movie continues to focus on Cage.

Again, its not a horrible choice that they focused so much on Cage, but I did feel like it took away from the performances and utilization of the other characters. Leto does go through a change of heart from where he is in the beginning to where he is at the end of the film. I think his change of heart and what happens to him because of it would make a lot more sense if he had been traveling with Cage throughout the movie instead of getting pushed into rehab until the plot needed him to come back.

I've said it a couple times now, the problem with this movie is surprisingly not Nicolas Cage. Its how the movie was structured around Cage. Also if this movie had stuck to being a straight up drama, I think it would have been a pretty good movie. But there's a campiness and surreal thread throughout it that just kind of pulls me out of the movie.

Lord of War is still a movie worth checking out. It may not be perfect but you will learn a lot about the business of illegal arms dealing and you will get a pretty good performance from Nicolas Cage which is quite rare, especially these days. You'll also get good performances from Ian Holm, Ethan Hawke, and Jared Leto, even though they're overshadowed by Cage, and a pretty mediocre to terrible performance from Bridget Moynahan. But she's overshadowed by Cage as well so its not that bad.

Is it a ground breaking film? No. But Lord of War is definitely an entertaining one and worth checking out for sure, at least while its still streaming on Netflix.

But those are my thoughts on Lord of War. What did you think? Comment and Discuss below. You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 and you can send me your requests for future movies I should review on this blog. You can also follow me to get updates on movie news and reviews.

I'll leave you with this. One of the most impressive scenes of the movie is the life of the bullet montage. Its right at the beginning so I'm not giving much away, but it follows a bullet through its life and everything is goes to before its even fired. The CGI for it is really dated and it looks like a cartoon, however, it still is pretty interesting. Enjoy!