Review: Mortensen Impressive In 'History Of Violence'

'A History Of Violence' (R) (out of four popcorns)

How well do you really know your neighbors, your merchants, your local diner owner who is always there filling up your coffee cup?

That is the simple premise of "A History of Violence," an unusual effort for director David Cronenberg, who is better known his horror films like "The Fly," "Dead Ringers" and "Naked Lunch."

Tom Stall (Viggo Mortensen) has a good, small-time life. He has a gorgeous, down-to-earth wife (Maria Bello), two normal kids and he owns and runs a diner where everybody knows each other's name.

One night, two violent robbers take over his diner, threatening his customers and stealing everything in sight. In the middle of the mayhem, Tom appears to go into automatic mode and precisely shoots and kills the men threatening them.

His status as a hero is broadcast far and wide, bringing a lot of business to Tom's diner, including a few black-suited men led by a disfigured man from Philadelphia named Carl Fogerty (Ed Harris). Fogerty seems to believe that Tom is somebody else, somebody they have lost track of for quite a while.

Is Tom really what everybody in his small town thinks he is, or does he have a secret past that could threaten everything he has built?

Cronenberg does a pretty good job evoking small-town life and the easy-going loyalty between residents. But, even though the director tries to stretch out the suspense, you have a pretty good idea where the movie is going.

The first and second parts are like night and day in their tone, and the transition between the two really needed to be more gradual.

I was pleasantly surprised by the performances by Mortensen and Bello, whose good looks are often the focus of their characters. Here, they have to actually play people who they may not be totally familiar with and they never overplay their roles.

"A History of Violence" has some interesting things to say about how you can never really escape your past -- that it is always lurking in the background, making you the person you are today. But in the end, "A History of Violence" devolves into a messy bloodbath where nobody really wins.