If you have seen Brügger’s Red Chapel (and I really hope you have), you will be familiar with his fearless brand of documentary filmmaking. The plan this time is to buy an ambassadorship representing Liberia in the Central African Republic (CAR) through a “diplomatic broker.” Once credentialed, Brügger will establish a match factory as a cover for his illegal diamond smuggling operation. The shocking thing is he pretty much goes about doing exactly that, but there are complications.
For the record, these are very definitely blood diamonds he is talking about. There just aren’t any other kind in the CAR. That means the politically connected mine owner Brügger starts negotiating with is a pretty scary character. Indeed, there are real stakes for Brügger in this masquerade, including life and limb.
Frankly, Ambassador would be hilarious if it was a feature narrative, but as a documentary, it is rather staggering. The wholesale government corruption Brügger captures on film is widespread and pervasive. While some blame for the country’s lawlessness and desperate poverty is laid at the feet of their former colonial power, the good old French, there is truly no excuse for such dire conditions to exist in a country so richly blessed with mineral resources. Clearly, something is rotten in the failed state of CAR, and Liberia is hardly any better.
Looking like a character from a Graham Greene novel, Brügger plays his part to the hilt. Unlike Red Chapel, where the director was in a constant on-screen dialogue with the viewers and his co-conspirators in his attempt to punk the North Korean regime, Brügger largely stays in character throughout Ambassador. His neck is also on the line when things get dodgy.
