by Lions Gate
| Average Rating: |
|
| Sales Rank: | 13435 (lower is better) |
| Price Used: | $0.44 |
| Shipping: | Free Shipping on most orders over $25* |
| Availability: | Usually ships in 24 hours |
| Director: | Andrew Niccol |
| Release Date: | 2006-01-17 |
| Label: | Lions Gate |
| UPC: | 031398187394 |
| Binding: | DVD |
| Published By: | Lions Gate |
| ASIN: | B000BYA5G4 |
| Category: | DVD |
Actors and Actresses
Editorial Reviews and Product Descriptions
Product Description
This charts the rise & fall of yuri orlov from the early 80s in little odessa selling guns to mobsters in his local neighborhood into the early 90s where he forms a business partnership with an african warlord & his psychotic son. Studio: Lions Gate Home Ent. Release Date: 05/22/2007 Starring: Nicolas Cage Jared Leto Run time: 122 minutes Rating: R
Amazon.com
The lethal business of arms dealers provides an electrifying context for the black-as-coal humor of Andrew Niccol's Lord of War. Having proven his ingenuity as the writer of The Truman Show, and writer-director of Gattaca and the under-appreciated Simone, Niccol is clearly striving for Strangelovian relevance here as he chronicles the rise and inevitable fall of Yuri Orlov (Nicolas Cage), a Ukrainian immigrant to America who makes his fortune selling every kind of ordnance he can get his amoral hands on. With a trophy wife (Bridget Moynahan) who's initially clueless about his hidden career, and a younger brother (Jared Leto) whose drug-addled sense of decency makes him an ill-chosen accomplice, Yuri traffics in death the way other salesman might push vacuum cleaners (he likes to say that alcohol and tobacco are deadlier products than his), but even he can't deny the sheer ruthlessness of the Liberian dictator (a scene-stealing Eamonn Walker) who purchases Orlov's "products" to expand his oppressive regime. Niccol's themes are even bigger than Yuri's arms deals, and he drives them home with a blunt-force lack of subtlety, but Cage gives the film the kind of insanely dark humor it needs to have. To understand this monster named Yuri, we have to see at least a glimpse of his humanity, which Cage provides as only he can. Otherwise, this epic tale of gunrunnng would be as morally unbearable as the black market trade it illuminates. --Jeff Shannon
Customer Reviews
Cage-Niccol Collaboration A Tour-De-Force - Reviewed on 2008-09-28
"Lord of War" is a crafty, deceptively powerful film that comes off as a black comedy, but when measured in full effect, also serves as a potent statement on world arms, cynicism, and the very human of mental conditions - rationalization.
The movie follows the career of Yuri Orlov, played by Cage, who steadily but artfully crafts a career as an arms merchant, eventually becoming one of the world's most successful at his trade. Along the way, he accumulates a trophy wife (beautifully played by Bridget Moynahan), his brother (played by Jared Leto) becomes a drug addict, he becomes rich beyond his wildest dreams, and he acquires a mortal enemy in a persistent Interpol agent, played by Ethan Hawke.
It is not an understatement to say that Yuri goes through cataclysmic changes, and loses his soul and humanity along the way. As amoral a creature as we have seen in recent films, he can make excuses and has an answer for everything he does. Cage plays him first as an ambitious hustler who gets in over his head, then as a savvy professional, and finally, as an amoral, venal, megalomaniac who only cares about himself and his business. Everything else is to be managed, lied to, and avoided.
Andrew Niccol has become quite savvy at writing and/or directing films that make very adept and pointed social commentary with films like Gattaca, The Truman Show, The Terminal, and Simone. But he may have topped himself with this film, which take a hard look at the buying and selling of arms like any other commodity. "The Lord of War" is a fine, provocative film that takes a hard look at how cheap life can become when money and power are in play.
* - See Amazon
Product Page for shipping and pricing details.
Book Subjects
- Action
- Action / Adventure
- Action Thriller
- Action/Adventure
- Adult Humor
- Adult Situations
- Adventure
- Arabic
- Biting
- Color
- Confrontational
- Cons and Scams
- Crime
- Crime Thriller
- Crisis of Conscience
- Cynical
- Drama
- English
- Executive Producer
- Existential Crisis