Little is heavenly in EDEN, a drama based on a true story of jealousy, deceit, revenge, sex and murder, on a tiny island in the Galapagos, in which a group of people destroy each other instead of finding the paradise they sought. Jude Law, Vanessa Kirby, Daniel Bruhl, and Sydney Sweeney star in a crime drama that director Ron Howard and writer Noah Pink set in 1929, at the very end of the Roaring Twenties, the post-WWI decade of prosperity and exuberance everywhere. Everywhere except in Germany, which was saddled with both paying war reparations and soaring inflation, which drives some of the people in this chilling tale to flee all that. One is a German doctor-turned-writer, Dr. Friedrich Ritter (Jude Law), who has sought to escape civilizations strictures and Germany’s problems by moving to a barely-habitable island with his lover, Dora Strauch (Vanessa Kirby), a free-spirited idealist who also rejects convention. While Dora struggles to raise produce in their garden for their vegetarian diet, Dr. Ritter writes newspaper columns, to pay for supplies to supplement their meager but free life. Dr. Ritter’s columns praise their Eden, their free life off the gird, in glowing terms, which ironically becomes the problem.
Those columns provide them funds for occasional deliveries of supplies but they prove surprisingly popular, which also yields something unexpected: visitors who wan to join them in the “Eden” the columns describe. First to show up is another German, Heinz Wittmer (Daniel Bruhl) along with his wife Margret (Sydney Sweeney) and ailing young son, who plan to establish a back-to-land farm on this marginal island. Next comes the Baroness (Ana de Armas), a self-styled aristocrat, international celebrity and wild hedonist, with two lovers in tow (Felix Kammerer and Toby Wallace) and plans to build a grand hotel for all the tourists who will soon arrive. Friedrich’s and Dora’s dream of solitude and freedom are now shattered, as the world they sought to escape follows them to their island Eden.
It never occurred to Dr. Ritter that essays he was writing would draw people who want to emulate his back-to-the-land life but he seemed to omit that this Eden was an unforgiving place. An unforgiving it is: water is scant, soil is thin, and everything, from the wildlife to the plants to the weather, is trying to kill you.
There is, of course, a note of dark, ironic humor in this situation, but director Ron Howard’s crime drama has little humor in it, and the real story the film is based is pretty grim. At first, the doctor-turned-reclusive author tries to re-direct his earnest admirers, who have arrived to emulate his life, to another part of the island, one with the only other source of water but with less land suitable to farm. He hopes they will become discouraged by the harsh life but instead, Daniel Bruhl’s back-to-the-land idealist and Sydney Sweeney as his stoic, hard-working wife proves industrious. They do not leave.
Friedrich and Dora maybe could have lived with that, but when Ana de Armas’ the Baroness and her entourage show up it introduces a lot more chaos. At first tensions between the three groups are dealt with largely by ignoring each other, but soon things escalate, alliances are formed and broken, and all descends into total madness. Late in the unfolding events, another visitor arrives, Allan Hancock (Richard Roxburgh), one of Dr. Ritter’s financial supporters. Allan brings some welcome supplies, as he periodically does, and a bit of break in the building toxic events. But ultimately don’t stop things from going down on their deadly path.
It should be noted that the film opens with some misleading text, suggesting that 1929 was a time of hardship. Actually, that was only true in Germany, whose broken post-WWI economy was saddled with paying war reparations and out-of-control inflation, while the rest of the world enjoyed the Roaring 1920s, a time of prosperity, technological and artistic innovation and wild exuberance. All that came to an end with the October 1929 stock market crash that launched the Great Depression of the 1930s, after the events the movie sets in spring, summer and fall of 1929.
Curiously, the true story the film is based on actually didn’t take place until the 1930s, but setting it at the end of the 1920s makes sense, as it lets the film tap into the decadence and irrational exuberance of the 1920s in setting the tone of the film. Ron Howard cleverly sets this story in 1929 specifically, the waning days to the optimistic 1920s and just before it all came crashing to a halt with the stock market crash of October 1929. Howard then breaks the narrative into sections labeled Spring, Summer and finally, Fall, so we are aware of the ticking time clock counting down to the crash and depression, a disaster the plotting characters are unaware is looming.
The conflict between the Ritters, the island’s original couple, and Whittmers, the new intruders, starts out with just resentment and snubs but that quickly escalates, going from just rude to nasty to sabotage and murder, once the chaotic Baroness arrives. With little in the way of comic relief, the sleight ride of settling scores and toxic competition is a fast, chilling ride. A recap at the film’s end, of what became of the actual people, is chilling as well.
The strength of EDEN is it’s fine cast, all of whom do well. Standouts are Jude Law, very good as the writer who abandoned his medical practice to live a life of freedom to write and little else, and Vanessa Kirby, who perhaps outshines him as the doctor/writer’s fiery, unconventional and idealist lover Dora, who pointedly asserts she is not his wife when anyone dares to assume that, and insists on their vegetarian diet, with produce from the garden she tills tirelessly, with the help of her beloved donkey and despite her periodic bouts of weakness from multiple sclerosis.
Unfortunately, the film is plot heavy, with one bad turn relentlessly sparking another. We don’t really get a deep sense of any of the individual characters. There isn’t really anyone we feel like we can cheer for, as bad behavior abounds, although much worse from some than others. Perhaps Daniel Bruhl’s idealist farmer and his dutiful wife come closest to sympathetic characters, although Sydney Sweeney’s nearly-stoic performance does not help much.
This is one of those true-story tales that you would not believe if it had not actually happened. Director Ron Howard makes the most of this fine cast and this wild, dark story, to create a historical thriller that really grabs you by the throat, but this is a pretty grim story. The Baroness is the major agent of chaos but soon she is matched by the good doctor. Howard gives the actors plenty of space to work as they lie and betray their way into craziness, but the emphasis on plot hardly gives us a moment. Periodically, scenes of the harsh natural world remind us that this unforgiving land has its own threats to survival, with rocky soil, poisonous plants, venomous wildlife and a hot, dry climate.
EDEN opens in theaters on Friday, Aug. 22, 2025.
RATING: 2.5 out of 4 stars
