Why does the accent of Leonardo DiCaprio sound so different in Blood Diamond?

Question

The accent of Leonardo DiCaprio as Danny Archer sounded different in the Blood Diamond Film. I have seen quite a good number of Hollywood movies, so I have become familiar with their accents. When I heard Danny speak in Blood Diamond, it seemed different to me. For example, he says "bru" for "bro" and "Are you craze" instead of "crazy" to Commander Zero. He also uses of "huh" with every sentence. In fact, he pronounces his name as "Aurchor" for "Archer". All of this sounded different to me. I am not sure if I am right about the accent thing, but if I am correct, why is it so? Danny said "He belongs to Rhodesia". So as he is from Rhodesia, was his pronunciation changed in the movie for the sake of the character? I already looked around a bit, but didn't find any explanation.

Answer 1

Yes, he was trying to sound like someone from Rhodesia.

From IMDb:

It is a Rhodesian accent, or Southern African.
It is different to the South African accent, like the New Zealand and Australian accents are different.

Rhodesia, now known as Zimbabwe, has a small white population who have their own accent, which is often confused with the white South African accent.

In Leonardo DiCaprio's own words:

[I spent] a lot of time with the locals, drinking beers with them, hearing a lot of their stories. [I spoke with] a lot of guys from the South African military.

And of course I have an accent coach and he was there guiding me through it. But we had conversations with these people, listened to their stories, made them say sentences over and over again.

He also briefly talks about it in this video interview.