The East hit theaters in limited release on May 31st and is expanding to Austin June 14th. Check your local listings to see when it releases in your markets.
A couple of years back at South By Southwest I heard a bunch of good word of mouth on a film called Sound Of My Voice and went into it totally green, knowing nothing more than it was vaguely about a cult. What I got was an engrossing and intelligent thriller about a couple infiltrating a cult in order to report on it who becoming entangled (and engrossed) by the cult’s leader… a beautiful and mysterious woman played by Brit Marling.
Sadly (I think?) I was so certain that the cult leader would be a male that when she pulled back her veil I was immediately drawn in just like our lead characters. And, yeah, I’ve kind of gotten pulled into the cult of Brit Marling. I can admit it.
And so when Marling, who co-wrote Sound Of My Voice with Director Zal Batmanglij, once again reteamed with Batmanglij for The East… I was onboard immediately. And after the strong reception of Sound Of My Voice, it appears that Marling and Batmanglij had access to a little more money and a broader talent pool. Both Ridley and Tony Scott are credited as having a hand in the film and it is brought to us from their production company, Scott Free. Ellen Page and Alexander Skarsgard fill out the cast as the two leaders of the eco-terrorist group known as The East and are sufficiently complex characters who are fleshed out as much as they can be in a thriller setting. You’ve also got Toby Kebbell (RockNRolla), Patricia Clarkson, Jason Ritter, and Julia Ormond turning up to give a great ensemble feel to this production.
The East: Official Synopsis
Sarah Moss is an operative for a private intelligence firm called Hiller-Brood that is hired by corporations to protect their interests. She is sent to infiltrate an anarchist collective known as The East that has executed attacks on corporations. While she lives amongst them, she finds herself falling for the group’s charismatic leader.
The East would be a pretty interesting film based solely on its subject matter, exploring the world of eco-terrorism as well as privatized security firms. This just isn’t a world I’ve seen a lot of on the big screen, and I found it fascinating. The members of The East are sophisticated and cutting edge activists who live off the grid and carve out their own society from the rubble of our own. Marling’s character Sarah must infiltrate the group by hobo’ing around in boxcars and learning the life of a modern day wandering hippy. This wealthy, highly-trained, and God-fearing woman struggles to adapt to dumpster diving for her meals. But she is extremely motivated and when her moment arrives to infiltrate The East, she takes the plunge.
If I have any complaints with the way The East plays out, one would be that Sarah manages to find and get “inside” The East fairly quickly. I guess anything else would have dragged the movie out unnessesarily. But her location of, and initiation into, this group all felt a little rushed. And then once she starts to really gain access to what their plans are, the story occasionally feels a little bit familiar to any other “undercover” story. She feels tension. She starts to become friends with the activists. Her loyalties are questioned.
One thing I do appreciate about the pacing beyond those quibbles is that Sarah ends up spending what feels like a lot of time with these people, and as they split up and reconnect over the course of several “jams,” or attacks against the system, Sarah has an opportunity to break away and head back into the real world. This was really an interesting angle as most undercover stories just dig in deeper and deeper. Here we see Sarah struggle in both worlds and that felt more grounded and authentic to me than if she stayed “in” the whole time. This also gives us a chance to explore the other rarely-seen world of The East, which is this large private security firm she works for. We are told that Sarah used to be a federal agent, but that she was recruited into this private firm. I’m trained as a moviegoer to believe that “feds” are the good guys, the law, the G-men. So I was immediately more intrigued and on edge about the fact that Sarah wasn’t even working on behalf of the government, but rather just a for-profit spy agency. For instance, she isn’t really infiltrating this group to prevent crime so much as to gather data for her increasingly shady boss. This feels a little seedier and creates another level of intrigue as the tension heightens.
As The East progresses, we as viewers feel more and more grey about the environmental issues being discussed. The East isn’t heavy-handed, in my opinion. Sure, it ultimately feels pretty clear that the filmmakers are more sympathetic to the leftist group than they are to the private investigation firm or the big corporations that The East targets in their jams. But rather than be a clean and neat little piece of propaganda for the militant left, The East shows just how many divergent paths each of us can go down when we follow what we believe. Even within The East there is disagreement about what it means to hold individuals accountable for their corporation’s actions. Should violence be utilized to gain attention for their cause? Or does violence make The East just as bad as the corporations they are targeting?
I won’t spoil the ending for you, because although The East feels familiar at times to other undercover thrillers, part of the fun is always finding out where our lead character ends up siding in the end. Sarah’s journey into The East is our journey and it is exciting and illuminating and feels largely authentic. The East will give you access to an unexplored world of cutting edge activism and high-level private security. It’ll also give you plenty of reason to pause and think about what you really believe about how corrupt the system is and what you are capable of doing about it.