These days people want to just act. To get it on. To just do it. To take the plunge. They say that if you don’t do it then you’ll never stop wondering what could have been. But on the other hand, if you indeed do it and fail then you end up wondering what could have been had you done it some other way. And you wish you could have done it this other way. But it’s already done and, worse, probably it’s irreversible. So I say, before you do it, say something, send that email, send that SMS, think hard and think twice. Take a look before you take that leap.
In the movie, Orlov narrates how he got started on the industry, starting with a few Israeli Uzi to truckloads of Russian AK-47s and even to tanks and helicopters. He tells how work has affected him: how he lost his wife, son, brother, his humanity… But this is not just about the story of a lost soul, it is also an expose on the industry. Throughout his story, the movie shows the ugly side of the industry (is there a pretty side?): people killing, people dying. And not just ordinary people but children. The movie also showed the drugs and the conflict diamonds which are frequently used as payments for arms are shown to complete the picture of how evil the trade is.
Unexpectedly a pretty interesting movie.
Rating: 4/5
There seems to be something fundamentally wrong with the training of cops (or lack of it) in the Philippines. A few months ago, anti-carnap cops of the Traffic Management Group (TMG) gunned down three alleged carnappers. Now they’re at it again. They shot at the car of a pharmaceutical executive.
Luckily, the guy was able to continue driving and the cops weren’t able to give chase. Had things been different, we probably would be reading in the news about a drug crazed executive (it would be hard to frame him as a carnapper) killed after firing at the cops. Of course, the scene will be complete with a sachet of shabu and a Jericho pistol. Maybe even a wounded cop.
But back to training. There’s the matter of proper flag down procedure. There’s the matter of car recognition. And finally, there’s the matter of the objective of anti-carnap cops being not to just stop carnappers, but also to recover stolen cars. Unless there is a clear and present danger to other people, they should just let the carnappers go if there really is no way of stopping the stolen car but to start shooting. After all, what good is recovering a bullet riddled car?
