Eden Review
Eden (2024) Film Review, a movie directed by Ron Howard, written by Noah Pink and Ron Howard and starring Jude Law, Ana de Armas, Vanessa Kirby, Daniel Bruhl, Sydney Sweeney, Jonathan Tittel, Felix Kammerer, Toby Wallace, Ignacio Gasparini, Richard Roxburgh, Paul Gleeson, Thiago Moraes, Nicholas Denton, Tim Ross, Antonio Alvarez, Benjamin Gorrono and Austin Hayden.
Ron Howard’s tense and disturbing new drama, Eden, has sort of gotten lost in the late summer movie shuffle and that’s a shame because it showcases a stellar cast and an effective character-driven story line. This film spins a fact-based tale of a group of people on an island whose lives spiral out of control in pursuit of an unusual version of the American Dream.
Jude Law plays Ritter whose significant other is Dore (Vanessa Kirby), a woman living with multiple sclerosis. This couple lives on an island where Ritter is in pursuit of writing a manuscript and finding some sort of fame while in seclusion. They engage in steamy sex at one point and seem to have a strong bond together that is upset by the arrival of another couple, Heinz (Daniel Bruhl) and Margret (Sydney Sweeney). Margret is also pregnant which further complicates an already delicate situation where food is scarce. There is some pleasant interaction between the couples, but things really spiral out of control when the manipulative Baroness, Eloise (Ana de Armas), arrives with an entourage of men, including two lovers, Robert (a well-cast Toby Wallace) and Rudolph (Felix Kammerer). With plans to make the island into a place rich people come to enjoy, the Baroness is ultimately not an easy woman to get along with.
Ana de Armas is splendidly wicked in the role of Eloise as she helps wreck havoc on a situation which was already pretty difficult to begin with despite the best of intentions of the other people living on the island. Soon, Margret becomes worn down as she gives birth to her baby right after confronting some vicious animals intent on, perhaps, doing something wicked to her. Eloise is a real nasty character, as she had a couple of men in her group steal Margret’s food right as she was giving birth.
Margret is the character that is most easily identified with as she explains the reason she is with Heinz is probably because he is the only man who seems to have wanted her. Sweeney is fantastic in her role, bringing depth to her character in what is, perhaps, the film’s most pivotal role outside of the one of Eloise, who is in a different category altogether. Ana de Armas bites into her own role, spinning it on its head as one of the most unpredictable characters I’ve seen at the movies this summer. It’s hard to know, at first, if she’s the main characters’ friend or their enemy until it becomes abundantly clear she is at her most selfish 99% of the time.
When G. Allan Hancock (the terrific Richard Roxburgh) arrives to film footage of the island, Eloise tries to put a spell on him, so to say, and hopes to get intimate with him, but Hancock is more interested in the action going on there on the island rather than getting it on with the charming, but deceitful, Eloise. From here, events spiral out of control as some people’s wicked natures are further revealed and good characters do what has to be done to survive and take drastic actions as a result.
This film could, at one point, divide the audience into taking sides with either the men, Ritter and Heinz, or the women, Dore and Margret. Ritter and Heinz make a choice that is supposedly for the greater good, but there is the potential to believe they didn’t act in the best interest of themselves and others through their actions. These actions are taken by the men to try to make their lives more tolerable while the women try their best to survive under extremely difficult circumstances. Unfortunately, Dore suffers the most and Kirby captures all her pains in a solid performance here. Who will leave the island and who will stay and, more importantly, will the ends justify the means?
Set in the 1930’s, Eden, plays like a thriller, but doesn’t always feel like it was originally intended to be one. There are a lot of scenes that develop the characters in a way that a thriller wouldn’t allow. There are several characters here such as Harry (Jonathan Tittel), Heinz’s son from another marriage, that don’t really get the development they need to make them absolutely necessary, but this is a true story after all so they must be here, for whatever reason.
Ana de Armas and Sydney Sweeney do the best acting here. Their characters are at two ends of the spectrum, one is decent, and one not so much. Sweeney shines in a stellar performance while de Armas has the film’s juiciest role at her helm which she takes full advantage of. Jude Law is surprisingly intense in a role that the actor handles extremely well, making his character a unique one, perhaps the most complex one in the film. Bruhl offers capable support in the nuanced performance of his role as well.
While Eden ultimately doesn’t always hit the right notes it needs to in order to be a mainstream crowd pleaser, it is often hugely entertaining to watch thanks to the gifted performers the film employs in the central roles. Ron Howard still knows how to make a solid drama even if this one doesn’t have the type of central themes to make one really come out of the theater saying that this was truly a great film. Thirteen Lives was Howard at his recent best, but Eden is Howard as his most complex as his characters here aren’t as heroic as usual. They’re mostly survivors trying to get by in a film that knows how to maintain interest from beginning to end.
Rating: 7.5/10
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