Eastern Promises

Cafe Society
1

This is an intersting movie I caught today. It’s David Cronenberg and Viggo Mortensen together again. This one is a very gritty little mobster story featuring Viggo as a Russian gangster living in London. The plot involves midwife (played by Naomi Watts) being drawn into the isolated lttle world of these mobsters by a baby. I won’t say too much about it because the plot involves a couple of nifty little turns (it’s not a “twist” movie, though, it’s just got some unexpected moments).

Viggo is great in this – the best I’ve ever seen him. He totally disappears into this Russian Mafia character. Even his accent is never distracting. You totally buy that he’s a transplanted Russian mobster.

It’s an economical story, not that long and quite businesslike. The look into Russian mobsters seems authentic (I wouldn’t know) and is intersting in how it echoes classic, Hollywood, Italian Mafia tropes in some ways, but does it in a totally unsentimental, unromanticized way. The Russian mob boss’s son in this thing (well played by Vincent Cassel) is an intriguing study all by himself. He’s expected to be a tough guy and a “born” Captain, and he tries to play the part, but he’s really kind of a wuss.

One more thing about the movie that may or may not be of interest to some people is that Viggo Mortensen has a naked fight scene in a steambath which goes on forever and during which the total Aragorn package (balls, cock and asshole) is on full display from about 60 different angles.

Anyway, it’s a cool little movie that might fly under the radar for a lot of people but it’s worth checking out.

2

[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic]
This is an intersting movie I caught today. It’s David Cronenberg and Viggo Mortensen together again. This one is a very gritty little mobster story featuring Viggo as a Russian gangster living in London. The plot involves midwife (played by Naomi Watts) being drawn into the isolated lttle world of these mobsters by a baby. I won’t say too much about it because the plot involves a couple of nifty little turns (it’s not a “twist” movie, though, it’s just got some unexpected moments).

Viggo is great in this – the best I’ve ever seen him. He totally disappears into this Russian Mafia character. Even his accent is never distracting. You totally buy that he’s a transplanted Russian mobster.

It’s an economical story, not that long and quite businesslike. The look into Russian mobsters seems authentic (I wouldn’t know) and is intersting in how it echoes classic, Hollywood, Italian Mafia tropes in some ways, but does it in a totally unsentimental, unromanticized way. The Russian mob boss’s son in this thing (well played by Vincent Cassel) is an intriguing study all by himself. He’s expected to be a tough guy and a “born” Captain, and he tries to play the part, but he’s really kind of a wuss.

One more thing about the movie that may or may not be of interest to some people is that Viggo Mortensen has a naked fight scene in a steambath which goes on forever and during which the total Aragorn package (balls, cock and asshole) is on full display from about 60 different angles.

Anyway, it’s a cool little movie that might fly under the radar for a lot of people but it’s worth checking out.
[/QUOTE]

I thought I’d never see that scene again after Borat.

I’ve been watching the previews for this. It looks really good. Maybe even worthy of going to the show rather than waiting for it to come out on DVD.

3

I disagree vehemently. The plot is absurd, the accents are often terrible (Viggo rarely says more than a word at a time in Russian), the gangsters routinely speak in Russian and then translate for us by saying the same thing in English, there is an extraordinary amount of purposeless violence, a ridiculous homosexual subplot, some laughable dialogue. All in all a major disappointment. I loved A History of Violence by the same Mortenson, Cronenberg team so maybe my expectations were too high and it seems the vast majority of the fans on IMDB also liked the movie, but it sure wasn’t worth $9.50 to me. I honestly cannot think of one redeeming feature (possible exception: singer at an anniversary party sings Ochi Chernya (Dark Eyes - famous Russian song) and it was an excellent, authentic rendition (I thought) but the guy is so weird looking it is hard not to laugh inappropriately.) Weirdly also, I can’t remember one single gun being fired in the entire movie.

4

[QUOTE=denquixote]
The plot is absurd,
[/QUOTE]
Why is the plot so absurd? There IS a Russian Mafia, right? Mobsters (of all stripes and nationalities) often hide behind legitimate businesses, right? There IS such a thing as sex trafficking, right? The sex workers can be underage and they can get pregnant, right? There are such things as midwives, right? I don’t want to ask any more questions because I don’t want to give away any more of this fine little film, but you give no reasons as to why you thought the plot was absurd (and if you do, please spoiler box them). How in the world could this movie’s plot be any more absurd than the plot of A History of Violence, which you say you liked (I did too, and Viggo was robbed of an Oscar nom for it)?

Anyway, I pretty much agree with Dio.

5

It’s on my list. I like these types of films, and I want to see it on the big screen.

6

I’ve never even heard of it. Thanks, Dio, I will most certainly watch it - I like Viggo a lot and think he’s a fairly good actor and fairly entertaining. He sure does star in gritty flicks, though, doesn’t he? History of Violence was good but I was a bit surprised at the down-and-dirty sex in there (note: we usually watch action/sci-fi/comedy so it would have been a surprise no matter what) but it was more than normal, I felt.

To be honest I’d probably rent it to see Viggo naked anyway, but Russian mafia is cool.

7

[QUOTE=Anaamika]
I’ve never even heard of it. Thanks, Dio, I will most certainly watch it - I like Viggo a lot and think he’s a fairly good actor and fairly entertaining. He sure does star in gritty flicks, though, doesn’t he? History of Violence was good but I was a bit surprised at the down-and-dirty sex in there (note: we usually watch action/sci-fi/comedy so it would have been a surprise no matter what) but it was more than normal, I felt.

To be honest I’d probably rent it to see Viggo naked anyway, but Russian mafia is cool.
[/QUOTE]

It isn’t the sexiest naked scene ever, but he certainly is naked.

I really liked it. I wasn’t a fan of the very last scene; I found it unnecessary, but other than that it was quite good. The acting was great, too. Armin Mueller-Stahl was Oscar worthy, I thought. Just phenomenal. Really everyone was good though.

I quite liked the plot, a few of the twists were kind of obvious but nothing that really ruined the movie for me. The music was quite good too.

8

[QUOTE=Equipoise]
Why is the plot so absurd? There IS a Russian Mafia, right? Mobsters (of all stripes and nationalities) often hide behind legitimate businesses, right? There IS such a thing as sex trafficking, right? The sex workers can be underage and they can get pregnant, right? There are such things as midwives, right? I don’t want to ask any more questions because I don’t want to give away any more of this fine little film, but you give no reasons as to why you thought the plot was absurd (and if you do, please spoiler box them). How in the world could this movie’s plot be any more absurd than the plot of A History of Violence, which you say you liked (I did too, and Viggo was robbed of an Oscar nom for it)?

Anyway, I pretty much agree with Dio.
[/QUOTE]

I would love to have synopsized the plot, as I see it, but did not want to spoil the movie for others, (although I would probably be doing them a favor, I know they would not see it that way.) If someone cares enough to hear why I think it sucks, in detail, with spoilers, just tell me how to do the spoiler thing and I will do it.

9

[QUOTE=Anaamika]

To be honest I’d probably rent it to see Viggo naked anyway, but Russian mafia is cool.
[/QUOTE]

Yeah, the Russian Mafia is really cool, as is gratuitous and revolting violence. The Russian Mafia is more intelligently depicted on Law and Order than it is in this movie.

10

[QUOTE=denquixote]
I would love to have synopsized the plot, as I see it, but did not want to spoil the movie for others, (although I would probably be doing them a favor, I know they would not see it that way.) If someone cares enough to hear why I think it sucks, in detail, with spoilers, just tell me how to do the spoiler thing and I will do it.
[/QUOTE]

To spoiler box something do it like this but change the parentheses to brackets:

(spoiler)Bruce Willis is a GHOST!(/spoiler)

Change the parentheses to brackets and you get Bruce Willis is a GHOST!

11

[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic]
To spoiler box something do it like this but change the parentheses to brackets:

(spoiler)Bruce Willis is a GHOST!(/spoiler)

Change the parentheses to brackets and you get Bruce Willis is a GHOST!
[/QUOTE]

Thank you.

12

[QUOTE=denquixote]
Yeah, the Russian Mafia is really cool, as is gratuitous and revolting violence. The Russian Mafia is more intelligently depicted on Law and Order than it is in this movie.
[/QUOTE]

I don’t watch TV and I don’t look for intelligence in my movies. If I want intelligence I will pick up a book. Thank you for your comment however.

13

Count me in with those who really enjoyed it. I thought Viggo was excellent - menacing and appealing, and Vincent Cassel ended up being surprisingly three-dimensional.

14

[QUOTE=Equipoise]
Why is the plot so absurd? There IS a Russian Mafia, right? Mobsters (of all stripes and nationalities) often hide behind legitimate businesses, right? There IS such a thing as sex trafficking, right? The sex workers can be underage and they can get pregnant, right? There are such things as midwives, right? I don’t want to ask any more questions because I don’t want to give away any more of this fine little film, but you give no reasons as to why you thought the plot was absurd (and if you do, please spoiler box them). How in the world could this movie’s plot be any more absurd than the plot of A History of Violence, which you say you liked (I did too, and Viggo was robbed of an Oscar nom for it)?

Anyway, I pretty much agree with Dio.
[/QUOTE]

[spoiler] Yes, all of these things exist in real life, the only problem is in the way you connect them. That is what plot is. In this movie we have one of the oldest, trashiest stories ever told, young girl lured from her home with promises of comfort and wealth in foreign country that will come solely from her being able to use her talent, in this case, singing, but of course she has been sold into white slavery. CLICHE. She is a virgin who has been made docile after being raped by the grandfatherly head of mafia, by being injected with heroin repeatedly for months and yet seemingly, she has no problem escaping and going to a drugstore. She then goes to the hospital where she dies and her diary is discovered by midwife who has recently lost a child (because as her RUSSIAN (coincidence?) uncle makes clear, the races do not mix. The uncle who could translate the diary, refuses, so she takes it where? That’s right to the head of the Mafia himself who runs a fancy Russian restaurant, not to a translater, to the embassy, to a university, but to a restaurant, which she knows is not open. Then my favoirte scene in the entire movie - after Mafia head denies any knowledge of dead girl - midwife says she needs the diary translated - Mafia head, in best Bela Lugosi fashion says, there is a diary? Never mind how she managed to write and or secrete it or remove it from her prison while strung out on heroin.

Now, the gay son of mafia head takes on an assistant, Viggo - so we know right away something is up - but we don’t know how or why the son has done so. Viggo prove his mettle by dismembering a corpse, murdered for some unknown reason and by screwing a whore so mafia son can be sure he is not gay, though really so mafia son can watch. It turns out corpse had family, they want mafia son killed in retribution but don’t know what he looks like. Mafia dad, wheels turning, substitutes Viggo, so we get to see a naked Viggo dispatch two Chechen thugs in a bath house, midwife of course has been developing a thing for this seemingly ruthless killer along the way (I guess her heart knows) then we discover Viggo is really a Russian spy - CLICHE - then in the one clever idea, mafia head is going to jail for raping immigrant girl, so baby must be kidnapped and killed but mafia son is too sensitive to do the job right. Naturally Viggo and midwife have no trouble finding him before the deed is done. Vigo and son have big hug, midwife takes baby back to hospital, mafia head goes to jail, everone lives happily ever after.

This plot is absurd. [/spoiler]

15

Hmm, I can see your point about How did Tatiana keep the diary and then sneak out to the pharmacy. I also didn’t see any of the plot coming, which is commendable. Overall I liked it because it showed some new stuff I hadn’t seen before (and not just Viggo’s asshole).

What bugged me was this got an R rating but if he were using his naked body to have sex with someone, it would be NR or X ? Although I confess exactly what parts of him showed during the sex scenes in The History of Violence aren’t branded in my memory.

16

I thought this was an excellent movie, and felt that almost all of the actors did a great job (although I certainly wasn’t expecting to see Viggo’s Mortensen). I also liked the overall feel and cinematography - everything seemed gray and overcast, exactly how I remember London from my last trip there.

I also thought the very last scene of the movie was wonderful - and sad.

17

[QUOTE=gigi]
Hmm, I can see your point about How did Tatiana keep the diary and then sneak out to the pharmacy. I also didn’t see any of the plot coming, which is commendable. Overall I liked it because it showed some new stuff I hadn’t seen before (and not just Viggo’s asshole).
[/QUOTE]

I assume they callerd her an ambulance and that her things were transported to the hospital with her. I forgot to mention in my synopsis that Tatiana was pregnant with the Mafia head’s baby as a result of the rape, which seemingly caused midwife to be overly concerned about the child’s future well-being, since mom was now deceased. It seemingly never entered her mind to adopt the child until Viggo suggested it. More weirdness.

I do agree with the poster who said the film was well photographed or whatever, it was, I agree, a visual treat.

18

Maybe it was a bad night, or something, but I was seriously UNDERwhelmed by this movie. I don’t think I had all that great of expectations. I did like “History of Violence”. But I came away from “Eastern Promises” feeling like I kept waiting for the really great part…that never showed up. I thought the cast was great, and all did a good job. But the movie just seem VERY slow paced…like uncomfortably plodding slow at times.

I did feel there was a serious plot hole, however:

How did Naomi Watts character survive once she showed the father that she had made a photocopy of the diary ? (What was the point of needing the original if the possibility of another photocopy was floating around ?) The father knew that Naomi didn’t know what was in the diary, so he would have known she couldn’t be keeping another copy to send to the police or anything. Yet only rests once he gets the original diary ? If the (ruthless) father would have just gotten rid of Naomi early, he would have avoided a lot of trouble…and there wouldn’t have been much to the movie.

19

A couple of thoughts, and a couple of issues with the above derision:

Midwife lady takes the diary to the restaurant because its card is in the diary, not at random. After grandpa she doesn’t seem to know any other Russian people - or not to the extent that she’d go to them rather than follow the card first. It doesn’t matter that it’s closed because she’s not going there to eat - it looks like she just went after her shift ended or whatever.

We don’t know how seemingly easy it was for the girl to escape once or keep a diary; maybe the girls are allowed to keep random junk and books around/they assumed she couldn’t write anything important, and he escape could have been some kind of involved, heroic last semi-lucid effort to save her child in labor. I have no idea how things really were. But neither does anyone else; the movie doesn’t tell that story.
Granted, the diary entries read like a retarded drama novel - though I get the impression that this girl is not genius material anyway, from the inflections (and the voiceover’s slow, halting tone even though the diary is in her native language) - It’s very unlikely that she would write them in that manner, especially while high or in small bursts of lucidity. That’s not the kind of thing you write to yourself to reread later, it’s narration for an audience. It would have made more sense if it was a flat out letter for help or something.

It’s not necessarily weird that midwife’s grandpa is Russian. Maybe her home and the restaurant (which she said wasn’t far) are all situated near Russia town? We have a Russian district where a lot of Russians tend to live, and of course all the Russian restaurants are there too.
I don’t think the slavery thing was necessarily there to drive the story so much as it was a reason for midwife lady to get so deeply involved, feeling overly sympathetic for the child, once she found out what happened (because she was horrified by the foreignness/extremeness of the situation).

I also agree, though, that it was stupid how amazingly often totally Russian gangsters in private were speaking to each other in English/slow, English-peppered Russian, but they do that in a ton of movies. I think it must be some sort of Hollywood rule.
I think Viggo could have used a bit more practice (I used to work for Russians, the young business-y ones talk at like 500 miles per hour), but not too bad at all for someone who isn’t remotely Russian.

My problem with the movie is that:

I think they shouldn’t have come in with “OOPS! he’s a double agent, so he’s actually one of the good guys” at all (or they should have decided to remove it, if this was adapted from a novel). I think the plot would have been richer for the conflict of Viggo being likeable and somewhat emotionally driven, but also an opportunistic, precise killer trying to muscle his way up through the mafia ranks. Also, they could have lost the kissing at the end.

My verdict - a few eye-rolling moments, but mostly enjoyable, I wasn’t all over Viggo before but he was pretty cool in this, and I’m glad I went.
I really noticed everyone’s wrinkles, grooves and micromovements (especially chewing), and imperfections of voice in this movie. I think it added to the atmosphere. :slight_smile:

20

[QUOTE=denquixote]

It seemingly never entered her mind to adopt the child until Viggo suggested it. More weirdness.

[/QUOTE]

To be fair, she was trying to find the girl’s family, which would have been the first choice in where the baby should go. Viggo could have given her that info with his police connections.