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Eastern Promises is a new film directed by David Cronenberg from a script by Steven Knight. It takes place in London, in a seamy underbelly of the city dominated by Russian mobsters. One of them was played by Viggo Mortensen who gave us such a memorable performance is Mr. Cronenberg's A History of Violence. In A History of Violence he played an ordinary decent American guy who may have had a secret identity as a ruthless gangster. In Eastern Promises his character self-evidently a gangster, but he may have a secret compassionate decent sight, you see a twinkle of kindness behind his stilly eyes.

Naomi Watts plays a midwife at Russian hospital who delivers a baby to a teenage Russian girl who dies. The baby lives, and Anna, Ms Watts' character decides to do her best to find who the girl was and what had happened to her. This inquiry leads to the very top of the Russian mafia in London which is headed by a kindly grandfatherly restaurant owner played by the wonderful Armin Mueller-Stahl.

Now in some ways, this is a standard genre picture against the story with a lot of father-son conflict a lot of the bounds of loyalty and cogent behavior that govern the Russian thieves. The story told in Eastern Promises is a grim one, as in Mr. Knight's previous script Dirty Pretty Things that involves trafficing in human bodies and human misery. But next this movie really stands out two things, the first is Steven Knight's screenplay which is a very ethically serious socially conscious use of the film art genre. That is takes crime and violence and mystery and intrigue and uses them to illuminate some very serious and very real problems.

Mr. Cronenberg's direction is as usual, vigorous and formally daring. There're some really upsetting jolting moments of violence in this movie. And his steady, you could almost say clinical even cold approach to his characters undercuts some of the sentimentality in Mr. Knight's script. There's also a flicker of infatuation in the passes between Mr. Mortensen and Mz. Watts. Together and with the help of extraordinary cast, they create a haunted sinister strange world, that is also very recognizable and familiar .