The East

I am happy to see that my favorite woman in movies right now (Brit Marling) has finally broken away from Richard Gere and Robert Redford; two old creepers in Hollywood who are still somehow making films. Yes they are legends in that town and that is probably the reason, along with getting a paycheck so she can continue making real movies; that she worked with them in the first place. But I am 100% sure that the only reason they let her in their movies is because they are delusional and thought that they could still get a piece. I can’t blame them really, if Cash Warren can get Jessica Alba, then anything is possible.

Thankfully Marling has teamed back up with her co-writer and director Zal Batmanglij from Sound of My Voice to make their latest project in The East. If you have not seen any of her previous work, she makes low budget, thought provoking films that typically floor you with the movies’s final scene.  The East is no different however it’s not quite as good as its predecessors.

This movie is about Sarah’s (Marling) attempt to infiltrate an underground terrorist organization called The East who targets major corporations with their attacks. The film starts out with Ellen page’s voice explaining their latest attack and the reasoning behind it as they flood this CEO’s house with oil after his company recklessly dumped tons of oil in a local wildlife preserve killing most of its inhabitants and land. Sarah is a part of an elite private investigation firm that works for these major corporations and their sole job is to go in and expose these troublemakers for what they are and in the process bring an end to the bad publicity they receive which directly affects their profits. Well as is the case with most undercover agents (at least in movies), Sarah eventually finds herself caught in between her duty to her job and her new found empathy for the group.

What sets this film a part from the usual undercover cop story is that The East’s beefs with these corporations all seem legitimate. Sarah becomes more and more detached from the lifestyle she had in Washington D.C. and gets used to the counter culture living of the East. She even develops romantic feelings for their leader Benji (Alexander Skarsgard). But as the movie goes on, their attacks get more and more daring and you begin to wonder if their self righteousness crosses the line.

Overall I give this movie a rating of FRESH but it’s not as if it was free from some major flaws. Marling and Batmanglij already covered cults and their culture in Sound of My Voice but for some reason they felt the need to force some of those elements into this story as well. I caught myself sighing in disappointment during her first dinner scene with the group and their test of her selfishness. Then there was the “Do you mind if I bathe you” scene; which would normally sound hot but instead it just came off lame and kind of silly. My friend called these scenes their” team building activities” and after I finally stopped laughing I realized that she was actually pretty on point with her assessment. They did however have one team building activity that involved spin the bottle which initially seemed pretty pointless but comes back to make sense later on in the movie.  Also there is a scene where a screaming Ellen Page forces an exec to do something that is life threatening. I’m sorry but I’m only worth about fifty dollars, not 50 million dollars like these people were, and there is no way I’m letting a 4 foot 3 inch Ellen Page force me into doing anything. Not outside of the bedroom anyway. It was at this point that the movie got borderline preachy but thankfully it never quite crossed over into Michael Moore territory. 

What saves the movie is the acting and as usual with Marling, the final scene.  I would suggest catching it before it leaves the theater especially since Marling must have tapped into my dreams and realized that all I asked for was just a few scenes with her as a brunette.