EASTERN PROMISES (starring Viggo Mortensen)

[Elano]

http://www.focusfeatures.com/easternpromises/

The mysterious and charismatic Russian-born Nikolai Luzhin (Viggo Mortensen) is a driver for one of London's most notorious organized crime families of Eastern European origin. The family itself is part of the Vory V Zakone criminal brotherhood. Headed by Semyon (Armin Mueller-Stahl), whose courtly charm as the welcoming proprietor of the plush Trans-Siberian restaurant impeccably masks a cold and brutal core, the family's fortunes are tested by Semyon's volatile son and enforcer, Kirill (Vincent Cassel), who is more tightly bound to Nikolai than to his own father. But Nikolai's carefully maintained existence is jarred once he crosses paths at Christmastime with Anna Khitrova (Naomi Watts), a midwife at a North London hospital. Anna is deeply affected by the desperate situation of a young teenager who dies while giving birth to a baby. Anna resolves to try to trace the baby's lineage and relatives. The girl's personal diary also survives her; it is written in Russian, and Anna seeks answers in it. Anna's mother Helen (Sinéad Cusack) does not discourage her, but Anna's irascible Russian-born uncle Stepan (Jerzy Skolimowski) urges caution. He is right to do so; by delving into the diary, Anna has accidentally unleashed the full fury of the Vory. With Semyon and Kirill closing ranks and Anna pressing her inquiries, Nikolai unexpectedly finds his loyalties divided. The family tightens its grip on him; who can, or should, he trust? Several lives - including his own - hang in the balance as a harrowing chain of murder, deceit, and retribution reverberates through the darkest corners of both the family and London itself.

[Elano]

Cronenberg likens 'Eastern Promises' bathhouse scene to 'Psycho' shower scene

 TORONTO (CP) — There's a bold scene in David Cronenberg's new crime thriller "Eastern Promises" that moviegoers will no doubt be talking and giggling about, even cringing over, for years to come.

Of course, that comes as no surprise given the Canadian auteur's reputation for using blood and gore to explore perverse subject matter and links between violence and sexuality.

The sequence involves lead actor Viggo Mortensen in a brutal fight scene with a couple of thugs in a London, England, bathhouse - sans towel.

"In a way, it might become like the shower scene in 'Psycho,' " Cronenberg said as he sipped coffee in an interview ahead of the film's red carpet gala Saturday at the Toronto International Film Festival.

"It's what people talk about and one of the things they remember, but it's not the whole movie."

The acclaimed Toronto-based director, known as the so-called master of "body horror," doesn't mind discussing details of Mortensen's nude scene before the world premiere, saying "It's sort of out there, everybody's talking about it" anyway.

Keeping it under wraps is also next to impossible given the buzz that "Eastern Promises" is generating ahead of its release in Canadian theatres on Sept. 14 and across North America on Sept. 21.

The film is also slated to open Spain's San Sebastian Film Festival later this month and the London Film Festival in October, but premiering it at the Toronto event is of key significance since both Cronenberg and the festival "started together," said the veteran filmmaker.

"When I started, there wasn't really a film industry in Canada and there certainly was nothing like an international festival - nothing like that," the silver-haired director, 64, said in a noon-hour chat Friday following "about 20" interviews that morning alone.

"And it started very small and certainly I started very small and we just kind of worked our way up to a kind of international level of credibility basically together."

"Eastern Promises," filmed in gritty parts of London with a sex-trafficking trade and Russian subculture, marks the first time Cronenberg has filmed entirely outside of Canada and the second time he's collaborated with Mortensen. The rough-and-tumble American actor starred in Cronenberg's Oscar-nominated "A History of Violence," which made a splash at the Toronto festival two years ago.

In this latest film, he plays Nikolai, a chain-smoking Russian chauffeur for one of London's most notorious organized-crime families, which has a rigid code of conduct and uses body tattoos as symbols for events in their lives. Naomi Watts co-stars as a troubled English midwife who finds incriminating evidence against the mobsters, masterfully played by Armin Mueller-Stahl and Vincent Cassel.

Cronenberg said he and Mortensen "developed a wonderful collaboration" working on the first project together.

And after having spent countless hours in the editing room "looking obsessively" at Mortensen's face, gestures and subtleties, he knew the actor was perfect for this latest role as soon as he read the screenplay, penned by Steve Knight ("Dirty Pretty Things").

"I always thought that Viggo looked very Russian, very Slavic. He has those cheekbones. He's half-Danish and maybe it comes from that, I don't know," said Cronenberg, whose previous works include "The Fly," "Spider" and "The Dead Zone."

Cronenberg said the "Lord of the Rings" star also had a musical ear and grasp of other languages (Danish and Spanish) that helped him nail the Russian lines in the script - something Mueller-Stahl, a German, and Cassel, a Frenchman, had to do as well.

As in "A History of Violence," Mortensen's "Eastern Promises" character has a dark past and many layers: he's wicked enough to cut the fingers off a frozen human hand, but tender enough to show compassion for a prostitute.

Unlike "A History of Violence" though, Mortensen's role as Nikolai is also at times quite comical and, as mentioned above, reveals a lot more on a physical level - something Mortensen seemed quite comfortable with, said Cronenberg.

"As we were working it out, he just said, 'Well, it's obvious I'm just going to have to do this naked,"' the director said of the soon-to-be-infamous bathhouse scene.

"And I said, 'Great! Good.' "

[K.Dub]

Too much to read on a sunday morning. But Mortensen is a good actor. Sounds cool

[Elano]

Mortensen on 'Eastern Promises': 'I have to play this naked'

David Cronenberg put Viggo Mortensen through the wringer once. Now the actor's back for more.

AS Viggo Mortensen and director David Cronenberg plotted the unforgettable bathhouse knife fight in their new crime thriller, "Eastern Promises," Cronenberg told the actor he wanted realism and "body-ness." The director wanted to challenge his audience to really experience the intimacy of such violence.

"Well, it's obvious," Mortensen told him, "I have to play this naked."

Boy does he. And Cronenberg captures every clammy square inch of Mortensen's well-toned flesh as it's pummeled and slashed and slammed into the unforgiving bathhouse tiles by two clothed real-life professional fighters, turning an otherwise excruciating four minutes of film into a quintessential Cronenberg statement.

"Eastern Promises," a Focus Features release opening Friday in L.A. and in 1,500 theaters nationwide on Sept. 21, explores the fine line between fragility and brutality, humanity and horror in the lives of three Londoners: Russian mob driver and sometime "fixer" Nikolai Luzhin (Mortensen); London midwife Anna Khitrova (Naomi Watts), who is striving to unite an orphaned baby with her Russian family; and mob boss Semyon (Armin Mueller-Stahl), who hides his sex slavery trade behind the guise of a grandfatherly restaurateur.

The film is Cronenberg's first collaboration with Mortensen since their 2005 Oscar-nominated "A History of Violence," a critical and commercial hit that fans of Cronenberg's previous work -- "Dead Ringers," "Naked Lunch" and "The Fly," among them -- considered surprisingly accessible. It's also a tough act to follow.

So far, reviews have been strong, praising Mortensen's complete immersion in the role -- adapting his body language and perfecting the accent -- calling the performance "brilliant," and even "Oscar-caliber." Indeed, Focus Features' decision to open the film in mid-September, traditionally a dead period for serious films, could give "Eastern Promises" a jump on the glut of performance-heavy fare coming in October.

And despite its disturbing subject matter and memorable fight scene, the film could prove even more commercial than "A History of Violence." It has just three scenes of violence. But the director gives each throat-slice, each blood pool a natural, three-dimensional effect.

"I have a very existential approach to the human body," Cronenberg said. "I take bodies seriously, [as if] I'm actually photographing the essence of this person."

"Unless you have a story this profound, it doesn't matter how good anything looks," added Mortensen. "Then you just get an exercise in brutality. That's what I like about his films. It's like real life."

Mortensen is only the second actor in Cronenberg's 30-odd-year career to collaborate twice with the director. (Jeremy Irons is the other, having starred as twin gynecologists in 1988's "Dead Ringers" and as French diplomat Rene Gallimard in 1993's "M. Butterfly.") The affinity between Mortensen and Cronenberg was evident as the two friends deconstructed the "Eastern Promises" naked fight scene recently, sitting opposite each other in the director's fashionable Beverly Hills hotel room, volleying tongue-in-cheek gibes, often finishing each other's thoughts.

Still, Cronenberg pointed out that it took some convincing to get Mortensen to agree to the part of Nikolai.

"He plays hard to get," the director said.

"I'm always very reticent until I have a handle on it," Mortensen said. "I wanted to make sure I had the proper time to prepare."

Mortensen researches his characters exhaustively. To understand mobster turned small-town family man Joey in "A History of Violence," he took a road trip through the Midwest and spent time recording costar Maria Bello's uncle, a Philadelphia native, to nail his accent.

For "Eastern Promises," Mortensen set out alone for Moscow, St. Petersburg and the Ural Mountain region of Siberia, spending weeks driving around without a translator. (The actor speaks Danish and Spanish fluently and can get by in four other languages.) Mortensen studied the gangs of the vory v zakone (thieves in law). He read books on Russian prison culture and the importance of prison tattoos as criminal résumés. He perfected his character's Siberian accent and learned lines in Russian, Ukrainian and English. During filming, he used worry beads made in prison from melted-down plastic cigarette lighters and decorated his trailer with copies of Russian icons.

Mortensen's work ultimately became the foundation for the role, prompting some changes in the script and even guiding Cronenberg's direction. The actor credits Cronenberg with granting him the creative freedom to push his characters into surprising places. Cronenberg said he couldn't work any other way.

"I really invented myself as a director," Cronenberg said. "A lot of directors are very territorial and they don't really want to hear anything from other people, especially actors."

"They don't want to admit they don't know something," Mortensen said.

"It's a matter of control and fear," Cronenberg concluded. Instead, he asks actors to "come play in my sandbox."

"Once you accept that childlike-ness," he said, "everything else becomes more clear."

Mortensen's 360-degree nudity in the fight scene is a prime example of how their relationship aided the film. Despite its complexity -- hand-to-hand combat among three guys in a compact and very slippery space -- they rehearsed only a few hours and then captured the fight in just two days.

"I knew I was in good hands as far as the director went," Mortensen said. "It wasn't an exploitation. . . . After that fight, my character knows everything's different. There wasn't any other way to do it. So let's get on with it. The sooner we got it over with, the quicker I could heal."

"The makeup guy would say, 'Have you seen how swollen Viggo's knees are?' " added Cronenberg. "I said, 'No. Don't tell me that.' "

Recalling his vigorous and bruising staircase sex scene in "A History of Violence," Mortensen quipped, "It's revenge for Maria Bello."

[Elano]

i can't wait to watch this movie

[CRAFTY]

Sounds like this could be a nice movie. Thx for the articles btw...Viggo seems to be VERY serious about his job. Great to hear!

[eS El Duque]

saw it...they wernt kidding about the scene 

[Mackin]

i can't wait to watch this movie

[Elano]

NOMINATED FOR 3 GOLDEN GLOBE AWARDS

*Best Picture
*Best Actor (Viggo Mortensen)
*Best Original Score

[Mygla]

Great movie indeed... Not quite on the same level as A History Of Violence tho.

[PLANT]

this movie sucked.  boring

[Elano]

this movie sucked.  boring

 

[Nima - Dubcnn.com]

Just saw this... Loved it!!!

[CRAFTY]

Forgot to post feedback on this movie after I went to see it in theatres...
Good movie. Nothing overwhelming, but all in all a very solid picture. Viggo's one hell of an actor.

[Nima - Dubcnn.com]

Viggo's one hell of an actor.

Yeah for sure, he pulled of an amazing performance in this movie...he made the whole movie. I'm a big Vincent Castel fan and Naomi Watts is cool but without Viggo Mortensen this movie woudl'nt have been worth shit, his acting was great.