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Oy! What's this then? A London gangster film without Vinnie Jones? It's like Vin Diesel instead of Hugh Grant playing the uncomfortable foppish Englishman in a romantic comedy.

But 'Eastern Promises' is no ordinary English mob movie: no tracksuited chavs, no black Range Rover Sports with tinted windows, no mention of "apples and pears", "porkie pies" or "butcher's hooks". Instead it's an unflinching look at the city's Russian underworld. And it really kicks you in the crotch. Repeatedly.

It might be more conventional and restrained than director David Cronenberg's usual projects — 'The History of Violence', 'Spider', 'The Fly' — but that oppressive realism only heightens the disturbing nature of a tense story grippingly told.

With an impeccable less-is-more approach, Viggo Mortensen plays the stoic Russian-born driver/gopher/disposer of dead bodies for an Eastern European crime family. But even if his Nikolai Luzhin has a quiet charm, there's a real danger lurking behind those warm eyes, a tightly wound menace beneath that laidback swagger. You never quite know when he's going to snap. And he's the nicest of the bunch. This is a family that makes the Corleone clan look like the Waltons.

The worst is Kirill — impeccably played as part impetuous child, part unhinged sociopath by Vincent Cassel. Nikolai's immediate boss, his volatility is only matched by an ineptitude grudgingly accepted by his ruthless teddy bear of a father, crime lord Semyon (Armin Mueller-Stahl). The kind of man who dotes on his grandchildren as readily as rape a teenage girl, the family patriarch faces an unlikely threat from idealistic but naïve midwife Anna Khitrova (a wide-eyed Naomi Watts). She's uncovered the diary of a dead Eastern European teenager that may reveal the truth behind his quiet restaurant and sets in motion a dangerous dance of threats, intimidation and outright violence.

In so doing, Cronenberg unleashes a harrowing exploration of loyalty, betrayal and naked fighting in a Turkish bath — easily the most riveting but disturbingly graphic brawl in recent times — as Nikolai and Anna attempt to survive within the dark, claustrophobic embrace of the criminal underworld.

It's not a pretty sight but the captivating Mortensen, in particular, ensures that you can never look away.