Movie Review: Eastern Promises (2007, David Cronenberg)

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Cast: Viggo Mortensen, Naomi Watts, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Vincent Cassel, Tatiana Maslany, Sinead Cusack, Jerzy Skolimowski
Screenplay: Steven Knight
100 minutes / Color

A Russian Mafia movie that can fit everything we need to know within two hours and has us entertained from beginning to end is surely something nobody can miss. “Eastern Promises” gives us one hell of great gore fest with an awesome storyline, full of twists (ala “The Departed”, but a little more obvious) and surprises that will captivate you and bring into the world nobody would want to belong too.

Set in modern London within the mists of the Russian Mafia, a young 14-year-old girl dies after giving birth to a healthy baby girl. Mid-wife Anna (Naomi Watts), finds the diary of the poor girl in her bag and wants to retrieve it to baby’s family members. The biggest problem is its all in Russian. After searching and looking through the dead girl’s diary, she finds the business card of a Russian restaurant that happens to be owned by Semyon (Armin Mueller-Stahl), the head of the Russian Mafia.

Meanwhile, Semyon’s son Kirill (Vincent Cassel) has had his friend assassinated due to him calling him “a queer”. Along with his “trusty” chauffer Nikolai (our main star, Viggo Mortensen), they roam the streets of London and Nikolai listens to whatever the family and the Russian Mafia says.

As Anna and her mother and uncle try to uncover the secret of the Russian girl, Semyon’s at their back thinking that if she gets it translated then it would give the police a reason to send him to jail. Semyon tells Anna that he’ll translate the diary, acting like her friend, and after one night tells her that his son, Kirill, was the one who raped the girl.

As the secrets unravel more, Anna soon learns that the real rapist was Semyon himself and that the baby, which she has a huge attachment to, is his daughter after all. It seems that Anna and Nikolai (who’s been an undercover cop all along), need to take action and find a way to send Semyon to jail.

But Semyon is not stupid. He has watched his own back and does it quite well. First, he orders his son to kill the baby and secondly, he stages Nikolai as his phony son so that the people who are after his real son will kill him instead, seeing that he isn’t important to him anyways.

After the brutal assignation attempt, Nikolai survives (believe me, this scene was brutal and Nikolai was completely naked throughout the fight. Kinda nasty really) but must act quickly or the baby, now in Kirill’s innocent hands, will die. Nikolai knows that saving the baby will be able to send Semyon to jail forever, after a DNA test.

In a matter of seconds before Kirill drops the baby into the river, Anna and Nikolai get to Kirill on time and saves the baby from doom.

I’m afraid I’m not summarizing it very well, but if you see the movie, you’ll be utterly shocked with the images and the storyline and especially Viggo’s nude action scene. That came as a surprise, but it was one of the most realistic fights I’ve ever seen in my life. The blood is put in a context seen before, but you feel so happy (although shocked) to see something like this. It’s actually really, really cool.

Director David Cronenberg should definitely due more films. If he keeps up work like this every year, he is bound to reach Oscar Gold. It’s actually really sad to say that “Eastern Promises” should be getting pure Best Director buzz, but from some weird reasons, Cronenberg (not to mention Shankman for his work in “Hairspray”) is being gravely ignored.

As usual, Naomi Watts gives us another fantastic and interesting performance, but not strong enough to reach a reasonable “best” lineup. Her character was extremely understated and underexposed. When you watch the start, you feel the film is all about Anna, but 15 minutes after the movie, it all shifts to Viggo’s character, even though it shouldn’t. You begin to get the feeling that Watts is just a supporting performance, even though her “rank” as a star should make her the female lead…

Viggo in the other hand truly deserved his screen time. He is really so fantastic in this movie. Yes, he’s best actor worthy, but heck I need to watch more. As of this moment, I completely support his Golden Globe AND Screen Actor’s Guild Nominations. No, it isn’t just picking up the accent so well, it’s everything in general. His emotions were wooden; he was supposed to be bland and unfeeling. He didn’t fall in love even though there was a beautiful female lead; he does not suppose to, he should remain devoted to his job. He embodies all of this perfectly that it seems like he wrote the part of Nikolai himself. He was really so great.

As for Knight’s screenplay, it isn’t no Monohan’s “The Departed” (2006), but for an original screenplay, what a pretty smart screenplay. It surprised me that some writers are so smart and “out-of-the-box” that if you give them a topic, they can write a screenplay about it and add a whole new meaning to the plot. That’s what Knight did.

“Eastern Promises” is more gritty and more powerful then the ranks of let’s say “American Gangster” (2007), its no “The Departed” (which I’m saying for the 3rd time) but it’s great enough to entertain and maintain a great amount of performances (mostly Viggo) and perfect direction. Loved it.