One of Cronenberg’s best films, this Russian-mobsters-in-London crime drama boasts well-developed characters and startling violence, as a nurse inevitably gets too close to exposing the sinister activities of a shady restaurateur.
Review #3,003
Dir. David Cronenberg
2007 | UK, Canada | Crime, Drama | 100min | 1.85:1 | English, Russian, Turkish & Urdu
M18 (passed clean) for strong brutal and bloody violence, some graphic sexuality, language and nudity
Cast: Viggo Mortensen, Naomi Watts, Vincent Cassel
Plot: A Russian teenager living in London dies during childbirth but leaves clues in her diary that could tie her child to a rape involving a violent Russian mob family.
Awards: Nom. for Best Leading Actor (Oscars); Won People’s Choice Awards (Toronto)
Distributor: Focus Features International
Accessibility Index
Subject Matter: Moderate – Russian Mobsters; Morality & Injustice; Sexual Assault
Narrative Style: Slightly Complex
Pace: Slightly Slow
Audience Type: Cult Mainstream
Viewed: Netflix
Spoilers: No
This was the first-ever David Cronenberg film that I saw on the big screen. With little prior knowledge of his body of work, I didn’t think much about it.
I remembered leaving the cinema somewhat underwhelmed, and like for many viewers, the most memorable part of the film was the infamous bathhouse knife tussle, with a completely nude Viggo Mortensen sparring violently with two Chechen mobsters.
Chancing upon it on Netflix nearly two decades on, I decided to rewatch, and I daresay it is one of Cronenberg’s finest films.
It’s not the best place to start if you want to explore vintage ‘body horror’ Cronenberg (go check out films like Videodrome and The Fly instead), but if you are looking for a great crime drama with well-developed characters and startling violence to boot, this is worth the time.
So, behold Russian mobsters operating in London, as Naomi Watts, playing Anna, a nurse who delivers a baby from a dead woman with a mysterious diary, finds herself getting way too close to exposing the sinister activities of an old, shady restaurateur, his impulsive son (Vincent Cassel) and their driver, Nikolai (Mortensen).
“I can’t become king if someone else already sits on the throne.”
The intriguing thing about Cronenberg is that no matter what type of film he makes, and whether good or meh, each work is a world unto itself.
With Eastern Promises, he gives us intersecting lives, which is not an uncommon narrative trope, but it is the ‘flirtation’ with danger from both sides—Anna knowing more than she should and thus risking herself and her family, and Nikolai making, shall we say, strategic decisions as he seeks to advance the power ladder in the syndicate—that makes the story more compelling than it should.
As a football fanatic, I particularly relished those scenes of Chelsea fans (well, after all, it was a Russian billionaire who bought the club) on their way to a derby match, though several of them shouting ‘Arsene Wanker’ made me more than a little mad.
I take this example to show how Cronenberg was so in tune with the milieu he was working in—that time-marking Russians in London, mobsters or otherwise, felt so natural. I want a sequel.
Grade: A-
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Eternality Tan 