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Eastern Promises
REVIEWED BY DNA SMITH Special to Florida Weekly

King Features

Running Time: 100 minutes
MPAA rating: R

GRADE: A

Director David Cronenberg has come a long way from his schlocky, sci-fi/horror roots ("Scanners," "Videodrome," "The Fly") to more conventional human dramas like "Crash" and "A History of Violence." His latest feature, "Eastern Promises," a gangster thriller, continues this trend.

The film stars Naomi Watts as Anna, a midwife at a London hospital. One evening, an anonymous Russian teenager dies while giving birth to a baby girl. The dead teen has a diary in her personal effects, which Anna takes in order to get the diary translated from Russian to English so she can hopefully locate the girl's family and deliver the baby to them.

Anna takes the diary to an elderly Russian restaurateur, Seymon (Armin Mueller-Stahl), to be translated, not knowing that Seymon is the leader of the local Russian mafia. It turns out the dead teen was a victim of the Russian mob's white slavery ring, and the baby poses a threat to the mob's power structure.

Enter Nikolai (Viggo Mortensen), Seymon's driver and "Undertaker." Nikolai has designs for taking over Seymon's operation and needs to discover the baby's secret in order to affect a coup d'etat.

"Eastern Promises" is well-paced, beautifully acted production. Sure, a lot has been said about Viggo's bare-naked fight scene, but his performance in this film is worthy of an Oscar. Cronenberg keeps the tension taut throughout the entire film. There's never a dull moment.

My only criticism of the film is that "Eastern Promises" is one of those rare films that needs to be LONGER. The movie ends a little too abruptly. Another 10 minutes would've helped explain what happens after the climax.

Still, that's just a minor quibble. I highly recommend this film.

(c) 2007 King Features Synd., Inc.