Eastern Promises (2007) - A well-directed and entertaining film despite a few flaws

Review No. : 0011

Title : Eastern Promises

Year : 2007

Director : David Cronenberg

Country : United Kingdom, Canada, United States

World’s Verdict : Rotten Tomatoes – 89%; Metacritic – 82 out of 100; IMDB – 7.7 out of 10.0.

My Verdict : 3.7 out of 5.0.

Last week I discovered a YouTube channel that educates the world on culture and arts.  This channel is the The Nerdwriter and the video blogger has amazing analysis on films.  The Nerdwriter is very good in creating professional film analyses that are also magnetically entertaining.  One of his short analyses is “EasternPromises: A Study of Bodies”, this study talks about the 2007 film of David Cronenberg which is Eastern Promises.  I am ashamed to say that I never heard of that film before until I saw the analytical review of The Nerdwriter.  The analysis was so good that I got so intrigued to see the movie so I decided to make it the first film to see this year.

Eastern Promises (2007) is a film by Cronenberg, he directed several horror and sci-fi flicks back in the 70s to the 80s.  One of Cronenberg’s most popular movies is The Fly (1986) that starred Jeff Goldblum and Geena Davis.  Cronenberg also directed several drama and action films like M. Butterfly (1993) and A History of Violence (2007).  Now he is back with another drama through Eastern Promises which is a story about a Russian Mafia in London, it stars Viggo Mortensen, Naomi Watts, Vincent Cassel and Armin Mueller –Stahl.

The main story of Eastern Promises starts in a hospital wherein Anna (Watts), a midwife at a London hospital, finds a diary of a 14-year old Russian girl who dies in childbirth.  Anna is hoping she can get a clue from the diary to the location of the home of the dead girl.  This way she can find the girl’s family and give them the teenager’s baby.  In the diary she finds a calling card of a restaurant which is owned by on old man, Semyon (Mueller-Stahl), who happens to be one of the patriarchs of a Russian Mafia operating in London.  Anna goes to the restaurant and meets Semyon, whom she finds warm and friendly.

Semyon knows that the diary could possibly link him to his illegal operations so he decides to ask his son’s chauffeur, Nikolai (Mortensen), to get the diary from Anna.  Nikolai is under the unofficial Russian Mafia mentorship of the son of Semyon, Kirill (Cassel), but he is eager to be part of the organization so he takes every opportunity to obey and please Semyon.  Nikolai successfully delivers the diary to Semyon and he is given another assignment that will prove his loyalty and reliability.  Semyon is impressed on how Nikolai delivers results so he decides to officially ordain him as a member of the Russian Mafia.  Soon both Nikolai and Anna realize that people are not the way they seem to be.  I’ll stop here for I do not wish to reveal the plot twists.

The Good

• Viggo Mortensen – The character of Nikolai does not require much depth but the actor should at least look like he is patient and hungry for promotion and that he has his own secrets, too.  Mortensen delivers all the requirements but as I’ve said the role does not require much inner digging so this could have been an easy job for any other actors.  There are two things that other actors might find difficult to deliver though.  One is the accent, I’m not sure if Mortensen's Russian accent is believable to a Russian ear but he sounds Russian to me, alright.  Second is the nudity the role requires, and I am not talking about nudity during or after sex, this is total nakedness while aggressively fighting two men.  Mortensen needs to throw punches and kicks while totally naked and he just nails it.  The believable accent and how he handles a naked action scene is enough to say he is perfect for the role.
• Vincent Cassel – The character of Kirill is an immature son, a drunk and a closet homosexual.  He refuses to come out of the closet because he is the son of a mob’s patriarch and he knows it will be unacceptable to the organization.  Now this character requires depth and subtleness of acting.  I judge acting on two basic dimensions: The difficulty of the role and how convincing is the actor.  If the role is mentally, emotionally or physically challenging and that it requires abandoning one’s self then that role is considered to be difficult.  The other dimension, that weighs more, is the believability of the actor in portraying the role whether it is difficult or not.  Kirill’s character is difficult because the actor has to project subtle acting that will give hint of the personality’s secret.  Cassel amazingly conveys the character of Kirill, he acts like a wild Mafia man but shows hints of effeminacy and wild desire to be with a man.
• Armin Mueller –Stahl – Semyon’s character requires several facets.  He is a grandfather figure, a decent friendly old man, a disappointed father and a sly mob trickster.  Mueller-Stahl does all the jobs perfectly without acting over the top.
• Howard Shore’s score – The score is like a crying violin (you will know what I mean when you see the movie).  It is haunting, it is sad, it is lonely.

The Bad

• Drama or Thriller – The film is more of a drama than a thriller and I like it the way it is but I always wonder what if Cronenberg makes it more thrilling, especially on the story of Semyon and Anna.  The interaction of the two lacks a little bit of suspense.
• Stupid killers – The first scene shows a man whose neck is being slashed with a razor.  This man is a member of the mob that Kirill orders to be killed.  Soon the brothers of the man seek for revenge but the problem is they do not know the how Kirill looks.  Seriously?  If you kill my brother and I want vengeance the first thing I want to know is who you are and what you look like.  Seriously?  They considered themselves professional gangsters?

And The Ugly

• Naomi Watts' character – I like Naomi Watts and she is a good actor even in this film but there is a flaw in her character that I don’t quite understand which is over courageous.  Let’s just say that If I were on her position and I found out that I’m dealing with a mob I would immediately give them the diary.  Okay, probably I would also consider giving the diary to the police (which she did not do).  She eventually handed the diary to Nikolai but what I don’t understand is that she has the guts to return to the restaurant to provoke the gangsters by telling them that the baby of the dead girl is part of their family.  And I always thought she wanted to protect the baby!  I guess it’s my bad, she just wants to return them to her family.
• Lousy ending – I can forgive Naomi’s sometimes-thoughtless character.  What I can’t grasp is the ending that which for me is the bane of the movie.  Without giving the important twists here is the ending: Semyon orders Kirill to kidnap and kill the baby.  Anna and Nikolai ride a motorbike (Anna’s Ural motorcycle) to look for Kirill and find him a few seconds before he kills the infant.  It looks like Kirill is drunk at this point because he listened to Nikolai’s persuasion not to murder the child.  When the baby is already safe, Nikolai tells Kirill that he will take him home but Kirill refuses because he still wants to party.  I guess it’s understandable because it is New Year and he is drunk.  What I really can’t understand is Nikolai saying goodbye to Anna with a kiss on the lips.  That is totally cheesy and not essential to the film AT ALL.   And why would Nikolai leave Anna with a baby?  Is he expecting Anna to bring back (single-handedly) the baby to the hospital in a motorcycle?  One of cinema’s biggest question.

I did not like the ending of the movie but it is still a good film and I encourage you to watch it.  Story is good despite the flaws, it is well directed and I know you will not get bored watching it.  Who knows you might its ending.  For those who have watched it already, did I miss something in the ending?