Plot:The film follows the mysterious and ruthless Nikolai, who is tied to one of London's most notorious organized crime families. His carefully maintained existence is jarred when he crosses paths with Anna, an innocent midwife trying to right a wrong, who accidentally uncovers potential evidence against the family. Now Nikolai must put into motion a harrowing chain of murder, deceit, and retribution.
In a wet and dreary pre-Christmas London, an anonymous, distressed, 14-year old Russian girl staggers into Trafalgar hospital, on the verge of giving birth, hemorrhaging badly and with obvious heroine tracks on her arms. Pediatric nurse Anna (Naomi Watts) tries in vain to save both mother and baby, but in the end, all that remains is the newborn, and a diary written in Russian in the girl's purse, that contains a business card for a Russian restaurant. Haunted by her own previous miscarriage, and determined that the baby girl not be sent to an orphanage, Anna attempts to have the diary translated in order to identify the anonymous girl's family. In so doing, she becomes embroiled in the dark, seething world of crime, drugs, and prostitution of the Russian Mob.
The acting in Eastern Promises is uniformly excellent. Mortensen's Nikolai, in particular, displays a still, coiled menace that is chilling and intense, which plays well against Vincent Cassel's portrayal of the feral Kirill, whose confused and tortured attempts to live up to his father's criminal expectations set the plot in motion, and Armin Mueller-Stahl's stunningly nuanced performance as the crime boss Semyon: Satan dressed up as your favorite uncle at Christmastime. As Anna, unwittingly tossed into this den of serpents, Naomi Watts manages to be simultaneously vulnerable and tenacious.
Cronenberg's no-nonsense approach to violence is still in evidence here, from the shockingly bloody opening scene, to one remarkably brutal fight sequence that deserves to be written down in the annals of film history.
3.5/5
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