David Cronenberg's gripping crime saga, Eastern Promises, is a razor sharp, unsentimental drama of extraordinary power. Viggo Mortensen gives perhaps his finest performance as an ice cold chauffeur cum assassin for a highly dangerous boss in the Russian mob (Armin Mueller-Stahl). It's one of the most intense and subtly horrifying pieces of acting I've ever seen and it transforms Steve Knight's somewhat uneven and anticlimactic screenplay into something utterly gripping. Naomi Watts also does fine work as a nurse whose life is changed forever when she begins uncovering unexpected secrets that put her in the way of Mortensen's vicious boss.
Tuesday, December 25, 2007
DVD of the Week: Eastern Promises
David Cronenberg's gripping crime saga, Eastern Promises, is a razor sharp, unsentimental drama of extraordinary power. Viggo Mortensen gives perhaps his finest performance as an ice cold chauffeur cum assassin for a highly dangerous boss in the Russian mob (Armin Mueller-Stahl). It's one of the most intense and subtly horrifying pieces of acting I've ever seen and it transforms Steve Knight's somewhat uneven and anticlimactic screenplay into something utterly gripping. Naomi Watts also does fine work as a nurse whose life is changed forever when she begins uncovering unexpected secrets that put her in the way of Mortensen's vicious boss.
