Eastern Promises (2007)

Originally Written

Saturday, June 21, 2008

Prior to watching Atonement, Eastern Promises was my first viewing of a 2007 Oscar nominated film. It's a gritty look at the death and destruction left behind by the Russian mafia in present day London. The atmosphere of the Russian underground is definitely brought across clearly, but was the film and Viggo Mortensen's role really worthy of an Oscar nomination? I didn't think so.

Naomi Watts plays Anna, a midwife at a North London hospital. One night a young girl, bloodied and dying, is brought into the infirmary about to give birth to a child, the child survives but the girl, fourteen years old, dies. The only clues to this girl's identity and past are hidden in her blood stained diary. Anna takes the diary in hopes of finding someone to translate it and help her to locate the family of the girl so her baby can be given a proper home. Her uncle, who’s Russian, refuses to translate the diary so Anna takes it to a Russian cafe, whose business card she found within its pages. The owner of the restaurant does not appear to know the girl but agrees to translate the diary for her. What Anna does not know is that the information in the diary is quite serious and she's delivered it into the hands of the enemy.

Viggo Mortensen plays Nikolai, the driver and friend of Krill whose father and family are apart of the infamous Vory V Zakone criminal brotherhood. Nikolai is known as the undertaker, responsible for disposing of the families victims, but ironically Nikolai does not appear to be as vile as those he works for. Nikolai attempts to warn Anna to leave the matter regarding the Russian girl alone, but her persistence and ignorance only delves her further into a matter that could put herself, her family, and the Russian girl's child in serious danger.

Eastern Promises is a good film with one interesting twist near the end, but as a whole it really isn't anything extraordinary. The story is interesting and held my attention but it isn't anything that hasn't been done before and probably done better. Mortensen and Watts, both give good performances but neither of them is at their best. My biggest complaint is the quite abrupt ending, with an unusual run-time of a little over 90 minutes Eastern Promises suddenly wraps up the film right when the story is picking up speed and becoming very entertaining, leaving the future of one of the main characters in limbo.

I felt robbed with the rather weak ending which doesn't seem to give the film a proper conclusion. It's almost as if the writers are setting it up for a sequel (which is unlikely) or the producers ran out of money and decided to rap the film up, either way an hour and a half does not do this story justice and this abrupt conclusion is almost an insult to the rest of the film. Overall, Eastern Promises is a film worth checking out, but do be advised the film contains some quite graphic scenes of violence, which are a little head turning, and there is some brief flashes of male nudity from Mortensen in a scene which also includes some pretty graphic violence in a bathhouse. In the end, Eastern Promises is an entertaining and at times thrilling film, but it's far from perfect and far from Oscar worthy.

7/10