Two general rules: (1) I rarely write about movies here and (2) David Cronenberg movies tend to be overrated, pretentious pieces of shit. I’m breaking the first rule, but the second rule stands: Eastern Promises is largely a giant, heaping piece of steaming poo. The only saving grace for the movie is Aragorn/Viggo Mortensen, who is one of the few actors in Hollywood I in anyway admire. According to Wikipedia, “the film has been noted for its unexpected plot twist.” I’m not sure what the plot twist was: that the mob boss was the father of the child? that Aragorn was an undercover agent? that Aragorn become the de facto leader of the organization? All standard fare in this highly cliched genre of movie: the mob movie. The only difference between Eastern Promises and The Departed, for instance, is that one involves Russians and takes place in London while the other involves Irish and takes place in Boston.
Admittedly, parts of A History of Violence were tolerable, mostly after Aragorn and his son stopped being push-over douches.
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He is not Aragorn…he is Lalin
Coincidentally, “Carlito’s Way,” which we’ve never seen, was on TV last night. Because neither of us can stand Al Pacino (does anyone except idiots like “Serpico”?) and I can’t stand Sean Penn (I’m not sure of Blythe’s opinion on him!) and because we didn’t know it was on, we didn’t watch it. We did, however, see the scene where Aragorn wears a wire and complains about carrying diapers around with him. This reconfirmed my original assessment of Viggo Mortensen: even in shitty movies (c.f., if you will, “GI Jane”), he’s the best thing. Therefore, while Lalin was a good character in a terrible movie, Aragorn was an awesome character in an awesome series of movies. Viggo remains Aragorn.
why cant you stand Al Pacino? do you have a reason or are you just a whiny little complainer?
Easily the best comment ever.
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