Otto, Auteur Theory in Eastern Promises

Director David Cronenberg’s Eastern Promises(2007) is about a a young girl, forced to be a sex slave, a family attempting to adapt to a new home, and a violent Russian mob family trying to keep secrets from both each other and the rest of the world. This film was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actor in a Leading Role, as well as many other awards, many of which were won. Starring Viggo Mortensen, Naomi Watts and Armin Mueller-Stahl, Cronenberg’s film speaks to the violence of the mob and what people will do to protect their family, as well as how characters can change and develop. Like other film’s of Cronenberg’s, this film was shot to be realistic, and at times quite violent and gory, showing the wounds inflicted on others and filming the death of those who have had too much. David Cronenberg seems to have a specific style in his methods of directing a film, and in all of them, the auteur is easily recognizable through the bodily pain that character display, not only through their development, but on their bodies as well.

The first shot shows Nikolai(Mortensen) crawling on the floor of a bath house, a place where he was betrayed and almost killed. He fights his way, naked, to defeat two men who come in to murder him. It is also important to note the tattoos which he has all over his body. These tattoos tell the story of his life, and as it is explained in the film, if one has no tattoos, one does does exist, one does not have a past. With blood all over from being cut multiple times, Nikolai ends up in a hospital, very weak from his latest endeavor to protect himself from the Russian mob family with whom he had recently become familiar with. This shot emphasizes Cronenberg’s realistic style, as well as his knack for making scene look as though a massacre has taken place. Even with just the bathroom scene, the mise en scene speaks loudly of the work of Cronenberg.

The second and third shots demonstrate much of the same, with fingers being cut off, a thing which would often be cut out, not shown on film, yet here is a close-up shot and the sounds of the bone breaking as the man performing the action struggles to break it off, as well as the blood flowing from the man’s neck, who is murdered because he was thought to have been sharing secrets with others. These three shots all share a common factor of blood, violence, pain, and human mutilation. The man whose finger tips are being removed is the same man who was murdered by the young boy, a boy was was essentially forced to kill, and in return is murdered himself because of his actions. This is another theme that runs through the films of Cronenberg, the idea of betrayal and lies, and the pain and suffering one endures because of others, both mentally and physically.

Cronenberg’s auteur style, violent and bloody, says something about human nature and his realistic style of death and human destruction, as well as character growth is so distinct that many can see his films and know his work. There were good and bad reviews regarding this film, but all were able to recognize the bloody work of Cronenberg.