Lord of War - 6

This film is not an action adventure flick. I was actually pleasantly surprised to find this out. It is more along the lines of a political satire, in the same vein as Catch-22, and Dr. Strangelove, and the story of Albert Speer, a Nazi architect who refused to consider his work as political. Any thoughtful viewer will realize that it is a critique of dualism. In other words, it points to the absurdity as well as prevalence of the separation of public discourse and private values, the idea of a divided identity where work and family life are opposed and contradictory. The story is about a gun runner named Yuri, the son of Russian immigrants. He then goes on to make it big by being apolitical, selling guns to both sides of major wars in Asia, Russian and Africa. It uses this story to make social commentary on the ethics of guns and warfare, and asks the audience to question the modern bureaucracy that doesn't see the contradiction of their dualistic mindset. The conclusion of the film is that living with this dualism will not allow you to live the good life. At some point you will have to take sides, and that choice will start to determine future choices. This film is an a good conversation started about the current way that people view the distinction between one's private and public life, and if there really is one.
As a funny side note, the power went out with about 2 minutes left in the film, so there was some delay, in which the two older couples that were in the theatre made comments about how horrible the film was, with its subtle Republican bashing. Which in some way points to the ability of film to make viewers think even if they are thinking about how they only want to be amused.