“The story of three very different people with very different agendas, whose lives intersect, was fuel for a very moving and dramatic adventure.”

Like the filmmakers, the cast dedicated themselves to gaining as much knowledge as they could about the time, the place and the circumstances surrounding the story of “Blood Diamond” in preparation for their respective roles.

Leonardo DiCaprio, who worked extremely hard perfecting his accent to play the part of ex-mercenary Danny Archer, affirms, “As soon as I read the script, I knew there would be a tremendous amount of personal research involved and that was one of the reasons I was immediately drawn to it. It was imperative for all of us to immerse ourselves in this world and hear firsthand accounts of what happened. For me, playing this man from what was Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), it was especially important to listen to the local people speak. This was an environment unlike anything I’d experienced in my life.”

Jennifer Connelly, who stars as the driven journalist Maddy Bowen, sought out reporters who could give her a better grasp of the life of a female war correspondent. She notes, “I have a friend who, it so happens, had been in Sierra Leone in 1999 writing a piece on conflict diamonds. I got a lot of information and insight from her and from friends of hers. I became very intrigued by these women who were always fiercely intelligent and knowledgeable and often, I found, deeply feisty. I saw an apparent love of adventure, matched by an unflinching commitment to their work. I think that combination of attributes also applies to Maddy.”

Originally from the African country of Benin, Djimon Hounsou came to the role of the Mende fisherman Solomon Vandy with perhaps a more innate understanding of his character. “One of the most interesting things about this film is that it shows what average men and women of that continent deal with on a daily basis,” Hounsou comments. “Solomon is a simple fisherman who is caught in the middle of the chaos of civil war. He is torn away from his family and loses his son to the rebels. In many countries like my own or Sierra Leone, a son represents so much. A son has the potential to be all the things his father dreamed of being but never had the opportunity to become. It means everything in his life to save that child.”

Zwick offers, “The story of three very different people with very different agendas, whose lives intersect, was fuel for a very moving dramatic adventure.”