Summary:
Lord of War begins with narration by "Yuri" and immigrate from the former Ukraine whose family pretended to be Jewish to escape to America. Yuri explains how his father had adopted the Jewish lifestyle, opening a Jewish restaurant, attending temple and even refusing shell fish. As he crosses the street from his restaurant to a nearby bar he realizes just what everybody in life needs as he witness the attempted hit on a mob boss.
Lord of War
I saw "Lord of War" on another boring Saturday night with a group of friends. I expected the movie to be a classic shoot 'em up type but was surprised at just how deep it was. Half-way through the movie I was quit disappointed but as it went on I was glad I did not get up and leave as it turned out to be a great movie.
The movie begins with narration by "Yuri" and immigrate from the former Ukraine whose family pretended to be Jewish to escape to America. Yuri explains how his father had adopted the Jewish lifestyle, opening a Jewish restaurant, attending temple and even refusing shell fish. As he crosses the street from his restaurant to a nearby bar he realizes just what everybody in life needs as he witness the attempted hit on a mob boss. After coming to the conclusion that he wanted to be the one to supply to guns to any he needs them he makes his first contact through his "Jewish" heritage by making friends with a man at temple. After making a sale the first motif in the movie is exposed to the audience as Yuri asks his younger brother Vitaly to join him in his new business. Vitaly refuses but as Yuri begins speaking in there mother tongue of Ukrainian he begins to think deeper and the clincher comes as Yuri drops the line he uses through the rest of this movie to talk Vitaly into anything, "Brothers in arms"" Vitaly repeats the line and the two begin on their new adventure. We skip forward to the Berlin Arms Fair where Yuri and Vitaly decided to attend in order to make a few important contacts, as Yuri realized one must sell to armies and not individuals to make the real money in the illegal arms trade, especially Simeon Weisz, a very important arms dealer who could really move them up in the world. Yuri moves up quickly in the world selling to anybody and everybody who wants guns. He doesn't take sides and sells to both sides of any war and even to those fighting his mother country. As he is running guns into Columbia we are introduced to one of Yuri's main rivals in the movie, a by the book Interpol agent who can never seem to nail him on any charges. After evading the agent and his men Yuri gets into Columbia and lets us in on a critical rule in the illegal arms trade, "Never get shot with your own merchandise." After refusing 5 kilos of cocaine from a drug lord he is selling to Yuri is almost killed and forced to take the drugs. Vitaly and Yuri take a sample of their new product and soon Vitaly has disappeared along with a kilo of the white gold. 2,000 miles and several grams of cocaine later Yuri finds Vitaly in a trashy little house with several whores and terribly addicted to the nose candy. He takes Vitaly back to the states and to a rehab where we encounter the motif of Yuri taking Vitaly in a limo and offering him one last snort of cocaine before sending him off. In return trips as Vitaly gets out you get a since of just how many times he's been there as he greets the orderly by name as he takes him from the car. Throughout all of the arm and drug dealing Yuri has worked his way up in the world and even managed to woo his boyhood crush Ava Fontaine, a super model from his neighborhood. Through lies he is able to convince her he is something he isn't and marry her. Soon he is overspending his large income by spoiling Ava and his newborn son with just about anything they want when he is delivered the best Christmas present ever, the fall of the Soviet Union. Through the help of a corrupt Uncle in the Ukrainian Army Yuri is able to obtain just about anything he wants to sell to the warlords of the war. He begins to sell particularly to the so called "President" of Angola, a sociopath in his own respect. Yuri digs his hole even deeper as his beautiful wife finds out of his double life and he promises to quit doing everything illegal in his life. He retired to making legal deals but is dragged back in as he realizes just how hard it is to earn an honest buck. With Interpol hot on his tail he once again begins to sell guns but after years of being able to tell when he is being tailed he does not realize his own wife is following him. After losing her trust she turns him into Interpol who finally have enough h evidence they need to finally put him away for a long time. Yet just as the Interpol agent thinks he has Yuri nailed there is a knock on the door, just as Yuri predicted, and a high ranking official tells him Yuri is to be set free and the movie ends as Yuri shakes a mysterious high-ranking looking officers hand and getting into a limo, off to sell arms to the world once more.
I give the movie 5 stars for its excellent use of motifs and camera shots. It seemed like you were right next to the characters in the movie and after a slow beginning it really drew me in. You felt for Yuri as Eva left him, and hated the "good guy" from Interpol even though he was trying to save innocent lives. I would recommend the movie to anyone interested in a surprise ending and thrill all along the way.
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