Emmanuel Itier: Did you anticipate the controversy that this film was going to cause?

Leonardo DiCaprio: I didn’t anticipate it, no. But when you approach situations like this, these are things that are based on real events. We’re depicting a specific time in recent history where these diamonds resulted in a lot of civil unrest in these countries. I had never anticipated that it would be this intense, by any means.

EI: Did you know about the diamond trade and the problems it’s caused in Africa before you did the film?

LDC: I think that I was like anyone else. I had heard whispers of it, but until I got there and until I read the script and started to do the research, I didn’t really quite understand the immense impact that these diamonds certainly had on Sierra Leone and other places in Africa. I certainly had heard the Kanye West song, for example. I had heard bits of all of this in conversation, but it really wasn’t until I got to Africa, heard the first-hand accounts, started to read the books and learned about it all that I really realized what was going on–what had happened.

EI: What was the motivation for you to do this movie? Is it because there are so many celebrities trying to bring attention to social causes? Do you think that it’s been a risky transition going from those boyish roles to the roles you’ve been doing?

LDC: Well first off, on the script–it was such a powerful character; it was such a powerful storyline, and that’s what you look for first. I mean, I wasn’t personally going out seeking films with social or political messages to them, or just doing it for the sake of doing it. It has to have some entertainment value. It has to be a good movie, and it has to convey a message without the audience feeling like they’re being preached to, and I really felt strongly that this script accomplished that. To me, it was very representative of a huge sort of issue in the world today, of corporate responsibility and what these corporations do. Certainly Africa has been a prime target for it, all the way from gold and rubber and all kinds of other natural resources. So here was this character that really represented someone who was exploiting people less fortunate than him, and dealing in the black market and not really being conscious of the world that he lived in. I just felt like it was a really powerful character. I felt that the dynamic between Djimon Hounsou’s character and my character was based on an earlier script, and it was really Ed Zwick and Marshall [Herskovitz] who learned about the diamond trade specifically and brought these political aspects into the story but in a way that I didn’t really feel was preachy, and in a way that I thought was really authentic. So of course, it’s always great to do a movie that you find entertaining, but it is also something that can give some sort of political or social message. I felt that this movie did that. As far as growing up, what can I say? I have to be honest. I never thought about that ever throughout the entire course of my career, about choosing a specific role because it would make me seem more man-like. Even with roles like “Catch Me If You Can”, I was eight years or ten years - I don’t know - older than the character that I portrayed. It was an interesting character, and I knew as well that playing a character like that, it might’ve been one of the last times I could play a character like that. I think that these things are really something that are intangible, that you can never really control. I keep saying this, but it’s the truth. You do these movies and you give it out to the world, and you really have no idea how people are going to react to you, the subject matter or whatever. I’ve been in plenty of situations where I thought that a film would turn out one way or that my performance would be looked at in one way and it just ends up to be an entirely different situation. Once you make these movies, you give it out to the world and then you get to take it apart.

EI: How did you work on and get the accent of a white South African man?

LDC: Spending a lot of time with the locals, drinking beers with them and hearing their stories. A lot of guys from the South African military I hung out with. I got to hang out with a guy named Tom Duff who’s really a sort of military expert, and just listening to them talk. And of course I had an accent coach, and he was there guiding me through it, but we had conversations with these people and listened to their stories, made them say sentences over and over again. That’s just the kind of thing that you do. I wanted to definitely go to Africa early because that whole area is completely alien to me. I’ve never really spent any time in Africa, let alone talked to a white South African man and listened to their stories and their accents. It was completely alien to me when I first heard of the film, so it was about going there.

EI: Have you been back to Africa since the filming of this?

LDC: We just got back. For me, Djimon and I became really close throughout the course of making this movie. It’s going to be a lasting friendship for me. Ed is my friend too, by the way.

EI: Spending so much time in Africa for this, what did you walk away with in terms of the culture there and the people?

LDC: Well certainly, for me, playing a character like this, as I said, who was taking advantage of the poverty around him and taking advantage of the continent created a lot of… what’s the word… uncomfortable situations as an actor, and having to portray this man on set amongst an African crew. In locations like Mozambique, where there was a tremendous amount of poverty–I mean, that’s a country right now that’s sort of having an economic resurgence, but still four out of ten people supposedly have HIV or AIDS. There are astounding conditions there, but what I was left with after spending time in Africa, and this is not at all to sound trivial, but it really was the power of the human spirit there and the fact that these people have been through so much. They’ve been through a civil war for 30 years. The poverty rate is astounding. Literally, people were still dancing in the streets. I mean, the joy and the energy and the happiness that they exude to everyone that comes into contact with them was unbelievable, and it made me come back home and not want to listen to anyone’s problems. I don’t want to hear about what we as Americans have to do. When you’re immersed in a place like that for six months and you see the extreme levels of what people have to deal with there and what their lives are like, it’s amazing–and yet they’re able to keep a positive attitude. I just don’t want to hear people’s problems out here anymore.

EI: Aside from the dialect research that you did, what other kinds of research did you conduct? And is there anything in Africa that just awed you?

LDC: Well aside from that, there was a lot of military training too. We had a great sort of stunt team, and then we did these faux military activities of like hunting in the bush and tracking in the bush, and what it was like to track in the bush. We hung out with a lot of guys who were in the South African army, and really that was a lot of the tough stuff–getting that military background–because they’re some of the best-trained guys in the entire world, as far as tracking is concerned, and living in the bush. I didn’t go out and live in the bush with them for a week, or even a day, but it was a matter of doing these sorts of exercises with them. Like I said before, it was really a lot of just hanging out and spending time with them and hearing their stories. There is only a certain amount that you can get from books, and you need to speak with the real people and ask specific questions that affect your character–questions that you have about your character. Otherwise you’d be skimming through hundreds of books trying to get that specific answer. What I was really overwhelmed with in Africa was its tremendous natural beauty. I mean, I got to go to some pretty amazing places. Every other weekend we’d get a day or two off and go on a safari or see the natural wonders of Africa. If you ever get the opportunity to go there, it’s something that you have to do in your lifetime.

EI: Can you just elaborate a bit on working with Djimon?

LDC: Well, his character is really the heart and soul of the movie. It’s the story of a man trying to find his son, and he embodied this character–and the word is “electrifying” that applies to the intensity that he gives in his performance. What can I say? He and I were kind of alone on set. It was me and him. There is no other actor that could’ve played this role and given this performance. I mean, he is astounding in this movie, and the intensity and energy that you get from him as an actor is amazing, and we got to play off of each other every day. He’s quite a brilliant actor.

EI: I understand that you two spent a lot of time in the swamps and the mud.

LDC: Yeah, and we would sit there and talk about the different kinds of hot chocolates that you can get in Paris, and croissants. We’d sit there and dream like two weird women about pastries.

EI: Did you get hurt at all doing any of the physical stuff?

LDC: Yeah, Djimon got banged up. I hurt my knee. Some of the sequences in this movie are pretty intense, that Ed setup. There was like a full week of squibs and diving behind cars. I’ve never really been in an action sequence that was that well-choreographed. Ed accomplished a lot of stuff–action kind of stuff.

EI: Do remember the last time you bought a diamond, and do you feel differently at all about doing something like that now?

LDC: Well, I don’t remember the last time I have. My mom is the only person that I would buy something like that for, and for a while now she hasn’t wanted one, but that isn’t to say that people shouldn’t buy them. Look, these come from my conversations with Global Witness or Amnesty International. You have to go into the stores that you go and buy these diamonds at, and ask for a certificate–ask for some sort of authentication that this isn’t a conflict diamond. You have to, as a consumer, use your best judgment to say, “You know what? I believe that you are truthful in what you’re saying. I see the documents. You’ve proved to me that this isn’t a conflict diamond.” That’s one of the biggest ways that this whole process can be put to a stop.

EI: So does that mean people can avoid buying those diamonds?

LDC: Does it mean that? I don’t know. Probably not. Probably not, but that isn’t to say that consumers shouldn’t go out and do that. They should just use their best judgment and ask the right questions, because ultimately diamonds are a source of economic stability in Africa. What they’re specifically trying to target is these conflicts diamonds, these diamonds that have funded these sorts of warlords and caused this civil strife in Africa. It’s about stopping those specific diamonds.

EI: You mentioned intensity, and you certainly showed a lot of that in this and in “The Departed”. Is that something that you like doing–playing with that pain in films and in roles?

LDC: I’ll tell you, quite honestly it comes from being a fan of this art form, of film. It really is that. I think that this is the great modern art form, in my opinion. There have been 100 years of cinema, but there is so much still yet to be done in this art form. I am a fan of movies, and there is something about watching films that are burned into celluloid for all time–it’s now a piece of history. You go watch these films. Being a fan of classic films, you watch these movies, and their children and my children are going to be watching these movies. To make a great movie is such a combination of different things that actually need to come into play to actually make a memorable film and not have a film sort of fall by the wayside–to have something live on through the years. That takes a lot. One of those elements is the commitment that the actors have towards their performances. That doesn’t always come into play. There’ve been a lot of great performances by actors in the past in films that weren’t great, but if you’re lucky enough to get that combination together and be in a memorable movie, that to me is like being a part of a piece of art that is going to last forever. So that’s where it really comes from.

EI: You mentioned your children. Are you keeping something from us?

LDC: Of course.

EI: Do you think that it’s too much to hope for changing people’s minds with cinema?

LDC: I don’t think that it’s too much to hope for at all. I think that there is tremendous capability there, and certainly in the world of documentaries. Absolutely. I mean, look at films like “Fahrenheit 9/11″ or numerous other documentaries that have changed the political climate, but I think that there is a tremendous role to be played in that respect, but that’s the key thing. And not to comment on this film or talk about how great this movie is, but I think that this movie is that rare combination wherein you’re able to get people into the audience and able to get people to be involved with the compelling story, and meanwhile they’re getting this political message. It’s also not hitting them over the head. They’re going to absorb this social message, I believe anyway. Traditionally, it’s kind of been one thing or the other. I think that this is one of those rare opportunities or combinations that is going to affect people like that, simultaneously, while entertaining them.

EI: What is the status of “The Eleventh Hour”?

LDC: “The Eleventh Hour” is something that I’ve been trying to do for many, many years–ever since I started in the sort of environmental world. I’ve been wanting to do a documentary that is really an environmental checklist that really encompasses every major environmental issue in the world and speaks to all the greatest experts, and it’s really–for me–a format wherein a lot of times what bothers me about watching people talking about the environmental movements in the media is that you have one person who represents the minority. They’re five percent of the collective great minds in the world, the greatest scientists and Nobel laureates. Then you have someone else who’s sitting on the other chair who represents 95% of scientific thought, but when they’re in the format of being on the news talking about an issue like global warming, it becomes an argument. It becomes 50/50, when that’s not the case. So the idea for this is to give these people a platform to talk about environmental issues without the argument anymore, because we’re beyond that. Certainly, I also want to mention an “An Inconvenient Truth”. I mean, that for me, and being a part of the environmental movement, I’ve never seen the issue of global warming become more of a household term since that film. It really blew the lid off of the issue. Talk about change from a film–it’s everywhere now. There is no generation that doesn’t know about that issue.

EI: There has been a big shift in Congress with the recent elections. Can you comment on that?

LDC: Let me just say I’m happy. I think that it’s taken a turn for the better, and I think that a lot of things that have been sort of subdued politically and a lot of things that people have wanted to happen are hopefully going to happen now. It’s really up to the Democrats now to not say things anymore, but to take action now. I think that they will.

EI: And the Oscar buzz on “The Departed… “?

LDC: The Oscar buzz on it? Great.

EI: Do you feel that, with this role in “Blood Diamond”, you might get a nomination for Best Actor?

LDC: I have no idea. I don’t know. Once again, that goes into the hands of all you people to pick this all apart and compliment it or insult it. So we’ll see.

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