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September 25th, 2007
ex_tsunami11
| 04:52 pm - Eastern Promises - "Using a body to file a progress report. Very original."
I won't lie: there will be a lot of people that will hate this movie. Some people will hate the accents or dialect. Some people will hate the blood and violence. Some people will hate the sex. Some people won't understand the plot.
But I really liked it.
The story is predictable if you pay attention, but it doesn't keep it from being interesting. Some of the best pieces of advice a writer can follow is to start as close to the action as possible, focus on the real story, and end in a natural spot. The writers managed to follow this advice to the T with Eastern Promises. The first scene involves a barber shop owner and his nephew cutting a man's throat. The movie then follows Anna (Naomi Watts) as she tries to find the family of an orphaned baby, and Nikolai (Viggo Mortensen) as he makes his way to the top of the vory v zakone. The movie ends on an uncertain note, leaving the viewer to wonder if Nikolai is truly working for the Scotland Yard, or if he's double-crossing everyone and working for his own gain.
The acting is, in my opinion, superb. Viggo Mortensen is one of my all-time favourite actors (amongst other things), and he does a brilliant job pulling together a character that has a lot of secrets and a lot of truth -- without telling you which are which. His felicity with languages pays off once more as he delivers flawless Russian dialogue. Naomi Watts, as well, delivers a believable character that one can readily sympathize with. Vincent Cassel, who plays the drunkard Kirill, is able to deliver a performance capable of drawing sympathy for the strange, cowardly character.
Overall, Eastern Promises is a squicky movie that will make almost anyone squirm in their seat. It is compelling and intense, without any sentimentality or Hollywood games. It's the kind of movie I love, and I hope to see more movies in this vein fighting their way into the theatres.
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