Atonement (2007)

Originally Written

Tuesday, June 3, 2008

Some books are better left as books and not forced into film adaptations, Atonement is one of those films. I'm not familiar with the novel by Ian McEwan, but judging from the films large focus of visual cinematography I can only guess that the novel is very much reliant on visual descriptions. This makes Atonement equal to a beautiful coffee table book full of extraordinary pictures and scenery, but devoid of any story to compliment them.

Atonement stars the lovely Keira Knightley as Cecilia Tallis and James McAvoy as Robbie. Cecilia's family is well to do, while Robbie is the son of the Tallis's housekeeper. But Cecilia's father has been extremely kind to Robbie and has paid for him to attend Cambridge with his daughter. The two have a noticeable unspoken desire for one another which they both discover they share when a rather explicit note, never meant for Cecilia to see, is given to her sister Briony from Robbie. Briony is the typical obnoxious younger sibling who feels the necessity to know everyone's business and reads the note before delivering it to her sister.

When Cecilia reads the note their unspoken lust for one another takes form, but when Briony walks in on them in the library getting a little frisky it's awkward for them all, to say the least. But the worst is only yet to come as Briony later stumbles upon her cousin Lola being assaulted in the forest while the family is out searching for two young boys (also the Tallis's cousins). Briony does not see the attacker's face but she's quick to force the blame upon Robbie, and while it's quite clear Lola has a pretty good idea who did assault her, she doesn't seem to be quick to say and goes along with Briony's assumption. Briony's quickly exclaims to the police she knows Robbie did it, all the while lying through her teeth because it's quite clear she's not sure. Robbie goes to prison for his accused crime and the film is fast forwarded four years in the future where he has joined the British army after given the option of prison or war. The rest of the film shows us the aftermath of Briony's lie and how it's affected the main characters along with their attempts to overcome it and regain their hold on life.

I love Keira Knightley, who has a real knack for period pieces, but Atonement did not fulfill my expectations and they weren't that high. Atonement is somewhere between a romance and a drama but never seemingly venturing too far into either. This was a problem for me because the romance between the two characters is thrown upon the viewer and never truly explored before it's quickly taken away. I had trouble imagining a real bond between the characters when there is no progression in their "true love", but just all based on the short library scene. So I really had no feelings toward the characters, other than disdain for the young Briony. The drama aspect as well seemed to be flippantly thrown into the film, mainly the second half, where we are supposed to share in the remorse of Briony, or the lovesick pain of Robbie who may not return from a terrible war. This felt more like a distraction from a romance that never was explored, and when the film attempts to throw that aspect back into the mix on numerous occassions I again felt it expected the viewer to accept a lot of aspects of the characters relationship that had never be solidified in the first half of the film.

Overall, I found Atonement didn't sit right with me. Numerous scenes jumping from past to present make the story confusing, the war seems to be more a diversion in the story than a addition, and the romance between Cecilia and Robbie didn't strike a cord with me at all because it seemed too flippant. It's as if large sections of the story were cut out and replaced with beautiful scenery shots, with an ending that makes the film that much more strange and confusing as you attempt to weed out what really happened.

I can't praise Atonement, the film looks beautiful but the story is so choppy and outlandish that I can only assume everyone who praised it was so caught up in the scenery that they didn't notice the mediocre story. If you want a real romantic drama watch The Notebook, that's how this genre of film should be done. The Notebook is assembled so the viewers actually care about the characters and the story is so touching that it drains the emotion out of you, there's none of that here. I can't even praise Keira Knightley; I wasn't impressed with her role and thought her character was rather bland and boring. If you want to see her in a good romance period piece check out Pride & Prejudice. In the end Atonement isn't horrible but the story isn't up to par with what it could have potentially been, maybe that's more the fault of the author of the book and less the fault of the film maker. But it still holds that the execution of the story is horrible, the performances aren't ground breaking, and while the visuals are stunning they're stunning enough to overlook all the aforementioned flaws. I think the standards of nominations for the Oscars have seriously declined over the years, it seems to be focused more on films that are only different, rather than films that are great; sadly this is far from great.

6/10