ALLAN HUNTER at the Movies

DIRECTOR David Cronenberg built his reputation on grisly horror tales where the visceral effects were matched by unusually cerebral, thought-provoking stories.

Recently, he has enjoyed unexpected commercial success with thrillers that bring a fresh eye to familiar material. ‘Eastern Promises’ reunites him with his ‘History Of Violence’ star Viggo Mortensen and is another compelling journey into a hidden world where violence has lethal consequences.

Set in a wintry London, ‘Eastern Promises’ features Naomi Watts as Anna, a British midwife who helps to save the newborn child of a young Russian woman who dies on the operating table.

Anna reads the woman's diary. Her attempts to uncover the woman's identity lead her into the city's Russian community and to charming old restaurateur Semyon (Armin Mueller-Stahl).

She also meets Seymon's ruthless bodyguard Nikolai (Mortensen), a mysterious, vampire-like figure ambitious to rise within the ranks. What Anna doesn't realise is that Semyon is a powerful, godfather-style figure in the Russian underworld and the more she investigates the more danger she faces.

‘Eastern Promises’ is an uneven attempt to blend a fairly conventional gangland thriller with the kind of social realist concerns that wouldn't be out of place in a Ken Loach film.

The story doesn't stand up to close scrutiny but the action sequences are horribly compelling and Mortensen is never less than spellbinding as the callous hard man who seems to regard death and bloodshed as a normal part of his working day.

Director: David Cronenberg
Stars: Viggo Mortensen, Naomi Watts, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Vincent Cassel, Jerzy Skolimowski
Screenwriters: Steve Knight
Certificate: 18
Running time: 99 mins
Country: UK/Canada
Year: 2007

© Allan Hunter, 2007