{"id":20183776,"date":"2025-08-27T06:59:00","date_gmt":"2025-08-27T13:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.metrosiliconvalley.com\/?p=20183776"},"modified":"2025-08-27T02:59:53","modified_gmt":"2025-08-27T09:59:53","slug":"movie-review-ron-howards-eden","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metrosiliconvalley.com\/movie-review-ron-howards-eden\/","title":{"rendered":"Blood-and-Guts Darwinism Reigns in Ron Howard\u2019s \u2018Eden\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Ron Howard\u2019s 53rd directorial effort, Eden<\/em>, is based on the true story of a group of European idealists who moved to a remote, uninhabited island in the South Pacific, circa 1929, in order to 1) escape encroaching fascism and 2) start a brand-new civilization dedicated to \u201csaving humanity from itself.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Things did not exactly go swimmingly for the experiment, as a 2013 documentary on the same subject, titled The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden<\/em>, points out. The doc\u2014directed by Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine\u2014combines the real-life writings of settler Dr. Friedrich Ritter and the home movies he shot with his partner, Dore Strauch. Ritter and Strauch\u2019s number-one goal, as a pair of German intellectuals in the 1930s, was to get away from Adolf Hitler.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cGetting away from Hitler\u201d may have a familiar ring to it for 2025 stateside audiences. The Ritters devote their time to quasi-political philosophical posturing, broken up by therapeutic sex. The new immigrants who follow them to Floreana Island have different agendas. Cue discontented campers among the iguanas and wild boars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Filmmaker Howard, never one to shy away from vigorous action in exotic settings (Thirteen Lives<\/em>, Rush<\/em>), takes an already pulpy story and makes it even gaudier (Howard wrote the screenplay with Noah Pink), starring Jude Law as Dr. Ritter and Vanessa Kirby as the equally free-thinking Strauch. Ritter is a pompous academic who references Nietzsche and belittles his partner\u2019s \u201carts and crafts\u201d efforts to set up housekeeping in the inhospitable landscape.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Poised against them are some other newcomers, a family of earnest, truth-seeking Germans attracted to the island by newspaper reports: Heinz Wittmer (Daniel Br\u00fchl), his plucky wife Margret (American actor Sydney Sweeney) and their son. Margret is a dutiful hausfrau whose still waters run very deep; hard-working Heinz is as flamboyant as a plate of mashed potatoes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The chief nemesis of all of the above is the self-styled \u201cBaroness Eloise\u201d (Ana de Armas), a classic femme fatale with a scandalous pedigree\u2014picture a combination of Imelda Marcos and Cruella De Vil\u2014fond of proclaiming to her mirror image: \u201cI am the embodiment of perfection.\u201d Soon after arriving on the beach to Wagnerian fanfare, the Baroness declares her intention to build a luxurious tourist resort on Floreana, from scratch. Thirty minutes in, Eden looks like a case of aging hippie farmers against delusional Coachella-style revelers. Everyone has a rifle. The scene is set for mayhem. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Howard\u2019s filmography is crowded with grandiose yet emotionally uncomplicated stories\u2014tales of astronauts, firefighters, hard-luck prizefighters, 19th-century whalers, disgraced U.S. presidents, rebellious mathematicians, rough-edged men and women of the Old West, and a generous helping of Tom Hanks vehicles. The sort of movies AMPAS enjoys giving Oscars to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a director of agreeable middle-of-the-road entertainment, he\u2019s come a long way since Grand Theft Auto<\/em> (1977). And yet Howard\u2019s characters can still slug it out like Roger Corman when the job is dirty and violent enough. Eden<\/em> shows us the Ron Howard who\u2019s not afraid to get down to the basic \u201canimal instincts\u201d that Professor Ritter and his fellow settlers display in the payoff scenes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The ham-and-cheese-sandwich prize goes to Ana de Armas for her no-turning-back performance as the Baroness, would-be empress of the Galapagos. When she isn\u2019t sneering down her nose at the dumfounded other colonists, the former \u201cBond Girl\u201d specializes in uproarious hoochie-coochie with her harem of hired studs, alternating with ordinary gluttony and careless gunplay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Compared to the Baroness\u2019 silly sexpot shenanigans, Kirby\u2019s Dore and Sweeney\u2019s Margret resemble Dust Bowl refugees, sweaty and exhausted by endless toil in the service of a socially constructed dream of enlightened utopia, however unattainable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sweeney in particular deserves a spotlight. Her Margret Wittmer is the Mother Courage of the piece, diligent and unwavering, even under duress. Eden<\/em> makes a strong argument for the female determinant in such rousing accounts of nonconformity. Hooray for blood-and-guts Darwinism! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Playing at multiple theaters in Silicon Valley.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ron Howard\u2019s \u2018Eden\u2019 is based on the true story of European idealists who moved to a remote, uninhabited island in the South Pacific.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14789,"featured_media":20183779,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_eb_attr":"","_expiration-date-status":"","_expiration-date":0,"_expiration-date-type":"","_expiration-date-categories":[],"_expiration-date-options":[]},"categories":[38],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\t\n\t\n\n\n\n\n\t\n\t\n\t\n