The striking images of “Eastern Promises” will surely haunt your memory many days after you have seen the movie and that is far from being a drawback for the once-again proven talent of David Cronenberg. Following the script of Steve Knight, the cinematographic production introduces the audience into a well-organized, Russian mafia.

Keeping the Russian social structure at a small scale, the mob develops its own Russian world under the shelter of London suburbs, protected by the appearance of a small family business, a restaurant. Focusing on tiny but very precise details, the crime drama is build on the pillars of interpersonal relationships and the symbolism of things, full of significance, but never spoken.

Breaks every murder clichés, the plot builds vivid and spine-shivering bloody scenes that just wake up the viewers from any fiction they might expect from a movie, to show a ruthless world in which killers murder without a wink. The whole scenario eludes every expectation and combines the novelty of action with the creative mise-en-scene.

The ethnic district the mob lives in becomes the haven of the recreation of the Russian world they come from. The head of the hierarchy, Semyon (Armin Mueller-Stahl) brought the roots of the old country morals and he will obey to them all throughout his acting. His demented son, Kiril (Vincent Cassel) that integrates the frictions provoked by the discrepancies a Russian native faces in an English society. And then there is Nikolai (Viggo Mortensen), the outsider, the cold-blooded, tempered family driver that earns Semyon’s trust and accomplishes the demands Kiril continuously pretends.

What triggers the action is the fact that one slave manages to free herself from the organization to give birth to her child. Wounded, she delivers her pregnancy, but dies, leaving behind her Russian diary. The midwife that assisted the birth, Anna (Naomi Watts), acts recklessly afterwards, her behavior engendered by her cultural closeness to the far away country passed to her by her father, a soviet immigrant that married a British woman; but also her new duty she feels she has for both the newborn and her mother, plus the human innate curiosity.

Though warned by her uncle to stay as far as possible from any links to those who wounded the girl, Anna heads just inside the dangerous rookery, seeking at Semyon’s restaurant answers to her enigma. Ignoring  either his uncle’s (Jerzy Skolimowski) or  mere Nikolai’s attempts to prevent her from the jeopardy she exposes to, she heads to the gist of the mob, and this is the means the viewer gets to know how complex the structure is.

The web both Cronenberg and Knight construct to highlight that however witty Anna may be, she stands a great chance to fall in the midst of the peril. It is an organization that has as foundation respect, trust and reciprocity and like other powerful crime organization that follows the mafia structure, vengeance and ties are quintessential. Anna is in the same time the weak, fragile girl that pries with curiosity, but in the same time, she hasn’t the blonde approach that would make her the easiest prey. She becomes a piece of the complex puzzle, a tiny, but engendering one.

Eastern Promises is at least a double opportunity to demonstrate the becoming-excellence. After Cronenberg directed low budged horror movies a long time, he finally inexorably strikes and creates a talented, non-clichéd scene setting, insisting a tempo longer with a camera to highlight the depth of an image or to prolong a moment to accomplish a scene. Also, Mortensen finally discovers the role that allows him to fully display his talent. In one moment he is the cold-blooded killer that won’t move a muscle while ending a life, in another he is the charming, well-mannered, almost seductive.

As I’ve stated, the 96 minutes will prove so gripping and chair-holding that you might proceed to live in the world of “vory v zakone” from the beginning of the movie, but prolong it a long time after it has finished.