Lord of War
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Andrew Niccol
Produced by	Andrew Niccol Chris Roberts Nicolas Cage
Written by	Andrew Niccol
Narrated by	Nicolas Cage
Starring	Nicolas Cage Jared Leto Bridget Moynahan Ethan Hawke Eamonn Walker Ian Holm
Music by	Antonio Pinto
Cinematography	Amir Mokri
Editing by	Zach Staenberg
Studio	Entertainment Manufacturing Company Ascendant Pictures Saturn Films
Distributed by	Lions Gate Films
Release date(s)	September 16, 2005 (2005-09-16) (United States) January 4, 2006 (2006-01-04) (France) February 16, 2006 (2006-02-16) (Germany)
Running time	123 minutes
Country	United States ‹See Tfd› France ‹See Tfd› Germany
Language	English Arabic French German Russian Spanish Turkish Ukrainian
Budget	US$50 million[1]
Box office	US$72,617,068 (worldwide)

Lord of War is a 2005 action drama film written and directed by Andrew Niccol and starring 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 post-Soviet arms dealer Viktor Bout.^[2][3][4] The film was officially endorsed by the human rights group Amnesty International for highlighting the arms trafficking by the international arms industry.^[5][6]

Contents 1 Plot 2 Cast 3 Historical accuracy 4 Production 5 Release 5.1 Critical reception 5.2 Box office 6 Home media 6.1 Warzones featured 7 References 8 External links

Plot

This article's plot summary may be too long or excessively detailed. Please help improve it by removing unnecessary details and making it more concise. (May 2012)

Yuri Orlov, a Ukrainian-American gunrunner, stands in a sea of spent shell casings in an African town. He states that with over 550 million firearms in worldwide circulation, there is one firearm for every twelve people on the planet- and ponders how to arm the other eleven. The opening credits follow, set to the Buffalo Springfield song "For What It's Worth." The life of a 7.62x39mm round is depicted as it is made in a Soviet Union weapons factory, shipped across the world to an African warzone, loaded into the magazine of an AK-47 and fired into the head of a child soldier.

Through voice-over, Orlov describes the beginnings of his career in the early 1980's. After he sees a Russian mobster kill two would-be assassins in a restaurant, he notices that the restaurant's purpose was to fulfill a necessity for food, so he decides to fulfill a necessity by providing firearms to those willing to pay. He partners up with his ne'er-do-well younger brother, Vitaly, and forms his own arms business. Yuri makes his first connection, through his oblivious father, with an Israeli gun dealer, who supplies him with his first gun, an Uzi, which he sells to some local Russian mobsters. Yuri's first big break, however, comes during the 1982 Lebanon War, during which he sells guns to all sides of the conflict.

As his business grows, Yuri tells of his first incident with Jack Valentine, an Interpol agent who is unusually idealistic and refuses bribes of any kind. Just before Valentine and a team of Interpol agents board a freighter of Yuri's, the Kristol, he orders the crew to quickly paint on a new name and hang a different country's flag. Tricked into thinking they have found the Kono instead, the Interpol agents leave after an Interpol intelligence operative on Yuri's payroll calls in a false sighting of the Kristol several miles away. During a business deal with a Colombian drug lord, Yuri is paid with six kilos of cocaine instead of cash. The drug lord refuses to pay with anything else, and quickly becomes furious when Yuri argues that he deals in arms, not drugs. The drug lord suddenly shoots him with the very gun he just bought from Yuri. Yuri gives in and takes the cocaine as payment, later discovering how useful it is as liquid assets. Vitaly takes one kilo to get high, and quickly becomes addicted.

After several months, Yuri checks Vitaly into a drug rehabilitation center. From that point onward, he conducts his arms business alone. Soon after, he courts model Ava Fontaine after forging an elaborate scheme where Yuri lures Ava to a false photo shoot. Later, they marry and have a child named Nikolai (Nicky). Yuri gets his second big 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 illegally buying tanks and other weapons from Ukraine's new military, through the help of his uncle, a former Soviet General, to expand his operations.

Yuri expands his weapon sales to conflicts in Africa, most notably in Liberia. His business garners him a close relationship with Andre Baptiste Sr., a ruthless dictator responsible for much of the conflict in Liberia, as well as the use of "child soldiers". Unable to charge Yuri for his crimes, Valentine reveals to Ava that Yuri is an arms dealer. Ava convinces him to stop dealing. Yuri reveals that it is not the income that has fueled his career, but explains, "I'm good at it". Yuri complies for a short while, but finds it difficult to earn as much through legitimate business. He is lured back in when his old client, Andre Baptiste Sr., in New York City for a United Nations meeting, promises him very good pay.

Yuri brings a sober Vitaly along with him to Liberia, claiming he can't trust anyone there. However, Baptiste reveals that the weapons are intended for the RUF rebels of Sierra Leone. During the transaction, Vitaly sees a group of RUF rebels kill a woman and her child with machetes, and tries to convince Yuri to stop. When Yuri refuses, Vitaly takes a grenade and blows up half the gun shipment, killing Andre Baptiste Jr. in the process. He runs to the other truck to destroy the other half, but the soldiers with whom Yuri has been negotiating with shoots Vitaly. Yuri then approaches the mortally wounded Vitaly, only to retrieve the activated grenade and return it to the very soldier who had shot his brother.

Back at home, Valentine follows Ava as she finds Yuri's secret shipping container, in which he keeps all his gun-running supplies. She leaves him with their child and Yuri's parents disown him after learning the truth. Yuri is arrested after a bullet is found in Vitaly's chest as it passes through U.S. Customs. Valentine, convinced that he can now find evidence to convict him with, tells Yuri that he has found his shipping container. However, Yuri reveals to Valentine that his superiors at Interpol will not allow him to be convicted, as he has positioned himself as a "necessary evil," someone who is able to distribute weapons when first-world governments can not be seen to be directly involved. This proves to be true, and Yuri is released after Colonel Southern speaks to Valentine and orders him to forget about Yuri. Despite all personal losses, Yuri returns to his career in weapons trafficking, acknowledging that the same governments that have shielded him from prosecution may eventually turn him into a scapegoat. He seems not to care, content with returning to "Doing what I do best."

A brief postscript notes that, while private arms dealers do conduct much business, the five largest arms exporters are the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia, France, and China, which are also the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council.

Cast

• Nicolas Cage as Yuri Orlov
• Jared Leto as Vitaly Orlov
• Bridget Moynahan as Ava Fontaine Orlov
• Ethan Hawke as Jack Valentine
• Eamonn Walker as André Baptiste Sr.
• Ian Holm as Simeon Weisz
• Tanit Phoenix as Candy
• Donald Sutherland (voice only) as Colonel Oliver Southern
• Sammi Rotibi as André Baptiste, Jr.
• Eugene Lazarev as General Dmitri Orlov
• Kobus Marx as Boris

Historical accuracy

Plot details on the illegal arms market, particularly regarding purchases for West Africa in early 1990s, are closely based on real stories and people originating from the former Soviet Union.

• The main protagonist, Yuri Orlov, is loosely based on several people.
  • His character as world's arm dominator is based on Lebanese arm dealer Sarkis Soghanalian
  • His name corresponds to the last name of Oleg Orlov, a Russian businessman arrested in Ukraine on suspicion of smuggling missiles to Iran. The real Orlov was strangled in Kiev's Lukyanivska Prison in 2007 during the investigation.^[7]
  • His exploits are widely believed to be based on Viktor Bout, a convicted arms dealer notorious for smuggling arms and other merchandise through several aviation front-companies.^[8]
  • His background is loosely inspired of Semion Mogilevich, a suspected master-mind in Russian organized crime who was born in Ukraine.
• The character Andre Baptiste, Sr. is partly based on Charles Taylor, the President of Liberia until 2003.^[9]
• The character Andre Baptiste Jr. is partly based on Charles' Taylor's son, Charles McArther Emmanuel. The character wields a gold plated AKS-47, much like one found in the private quarters of Saddam Hussein's son, Uday Hussein, during the US-led invasion of Iraq.
• The character Colonel Oliver Southern obviously hints at Oliver North, most famous for his involvement in the Iran-Contra Scandal.

The conflicts portrayed in the film are all real conflicts in real countries, particularly those in Lebanon, Sudan, Cambodia, Afghanistan, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. On the other side, the image of the Interpol as an acting security agency is entirely fictional.

Production

A scene in the film featured 50 tanks, which were provided by a Czech source. The tanks were only available until December of the year of filming. They were to be returned so they could be sold to Libya.^[10] The production team rented 3000 real SA Vz. 58 rifles to stand in for AK 47s because they were cheaper than prop guns.^[11]

Release

Critical reception

Lord of War received fairly positive reviews from critics; the film received a 61% rating on Rotten Tomatoes; the consensus states: "While Lord of War is an intelligent examination of the gun trade, it is too scattershot in its plotting to connect."^[12]. The film also received a special mention for excellence in filmmaking from the National Board of Review.

It received a 62/100 score with a 7.4 user rating from Metacritic.^[13]

Box office

The film grossed $9,390,144 on its opening weekend, ranking #3 at the North American box office behind Just Like Heaven and The Exorcism of Emily Rose. After the film's 7 weeks of release it grossed a total of $24,149,632 on the domestic market in the US, and $48,467,436 overseas, for a worldwide total of $72,617,068.^[1]

Home media

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 film, allowing viewers to click on each weapon to get statistics about their physical dimensions and histories. The DVD bonus section also contains a public service announcement from Nicolas Cage, addressing the issue of illicit arms sales.

Warzones featured

• Mozambican Civil War (opening scene)
• Sierra Leone Civil War
• Lebanese Civil War
• Somali Civil War
• Soviet War in Afghanistan
• Second Liberian Civil War
• Cold War
• First Liberian Civil War

Mentioned only

• Falklands War
• Iran-Iraq War
• War on Terror
• Yugoslav Wars

References

External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Lord of War

• Official website
• Lord of War at the Internet Movie Database
• Lord of War at the TCM Movie Database
• Lord of War at AllRovi
• Lord of War at Box Office Mojo
• Lord of War at Rotten Tomatoes
• Lord of War at Metacritic
• Guns featured in the film

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