The film opens with a flash — a young man's throat is brutally slashed and blood seeps from the open wound onto the barber chair he sits in. Another flash and audiences see a young woman collapse in a pool of blood spreading across the drugstore floor. The unthinkable has happened — the indestructible has been murdered and a woman dies, leaving her innocent child behind in the arms of her midwife.
Thus begins the Russian mafia thriller "Eastern Promises." Brutal and bloody violence, nudity, excessive language — the film delivers everything one might expect in a movie involving an organized crime family. Yet, "Eastern Promises," the latest film from "A History of Violence" and "Naked Lunch" director David Cronenberg, still manages to keep audiences guessing with its many plot twists. With its complex script and winning cast, "Eastern Promises" goes above and beyond the expectations created by the film's superficial previews.
The plot follows midwife, Anna Khitrova (Naomi Watts, "The Painted Veil") as she, armed with the deceased mother’s diary, travels throughout the city of London to find the child's family, but she unintentionally involves herself in a mystery surrounding the Vory V Zakone, the notorious crime brotherhood headed by wolf in sheep's clothing, Semyon (Armin Mueller-Stahl, "Leningrad"). Along her journey, Khitrova also encounters Nikolai Luzhin (Viggo Mortensen, "History of Violence"), the loyal driver and bodyguard for a family under the Vory, and an already complicated plot becomes increasingly more twisted and dark.
And it's this plot that leaves viewers clinging to their seats for the movie's entire 100 minutes. Luzhin's moral dilemma — a choice between deceit and murder or loyalty and retribution — drives the film's ever-thickening plot. Several lives hang in the balance based off this character's decision.
In addition to the plot, the set and cinematography, although gory and slightly off-putting, contribute to the film's riveting plotline. Dimly-lit, dirty basements and sterile hospitals bring the slightest bit of reality to a film that seems far removed from the everyday. Even the excessive gore is tolerable because it reveals and enhances the dark nature of the sadistic Vory brotherhood.
Also notable is the depth the actors bring to their complex characters. Naomi Watts effectively portrays a woman determined to do right by the dead teenager and her now motherless child. Watts brings sensitivity, but she also lends strength to Khitrova, who might otherwise be labeled as overly inquisitive. Mortensen also shines as the tattooed, brutal mafia member, and his Russian accent is so believable that any memories of Aragon are quickly erased. But perhaps the most convincing performance is from Mueller-Stahl in his portrayal of the gray sweater-sporting brotherhood leader Semyon, and he captures the figurehead's paradoxical nature wonderfully. All at once, Mueller-Stahl makes his character conniving and evil and charming and compassionate.
"Eastern Promises" is a film that will leave you clinging to the edge of your seat, wondering throughout what is going on, who's good and who's bad, and especially why the events are unraveling the way they are. Why is the diary so important to the Russian family? Why is Nikolai constantly warning Anna to forget the content of the diary and to protect the baby and her family? The final minutes of "Eastern Promises" offer answers to some lingering questions, but a misplaced cliffhanger leaves audiences hanging, wondering the fate of several major characters. For a movie that is as character-driven as it is focused on creating a labyrinthine story, this is rather disappointing.
But despite the ending cop-out, "Eastern Promises" delivers on its opening vow to grab hold of viewers and not let go until the credits roll.
