Atonement

The interpretation is so painstaking and moving that almost every moment delivers a shuddering jolt to the head and the heart.

This is one of the year's best films, a certain best picture nominee.

Nothing in Joe Wright's screen version of Ian McEwan's dense, internalized 2001 novel of secrets and lies should really work, but damn near everything does. It's some kind of miracle. Written, directed and acted to perfection, Atonement sweeps you up on waves of humor, heartbreak and ravishing romance.

In the end, Atonement sorts truth from fiction as it delivers a shattering kick to the solar plexus.

A handsome film, an earnest film, a film with taste in music and photography and a real sense of intelligence. But too often it feels like an exercise. And even when you're impressed by it, you know you're being played.

Wright wouldn't recognize unobtrusive if it tapped him on the nose--he's cross- pollinated the first half of Atonement into an Oscar-buzzy brew of Masterpiece Theatre and "Upstairs, Downstairs," with the wild English countryside tamed into an artfully lit fairy glade, and into just enough of a bodice-ripper to reel in the youth market. And not a bad one at that.

Imagine if the team that made "The English Patient" tried to make the same kind of movie, with even more brave-lads-fighting-the-Jerries porn and this time with Extra Added English country manor porn, and without really good actors, and this movie is what you’d have.

First: no, I never read the original book, I never found it in Portuguese in any bookstore. And starting from that base, I will refrain from checking if the film makes a good adaptation of the source material or not. However, I can already say that many critics have stated that the adaptation was reasonably faithful to the book. Therefore, I will rely on these statements. The story of this film is absolutely delicious. I was not able to fully appreciate it at first sight, so I decided to review it. I'm glad I did! The film is absolutely remarkable in many ways. He was nominated for several Oscars (Best Film, Best Supporting Actress, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction, Best Costume Design, Best Soundtrack) but the 2008 ceremony was particularly close and competitive and ended up collecting just one statuette. It is true that the Oscars are worth what they are worth, but they are not an absolute value nor do they define the value and quality of a cinematographic work alone, and there are many examples of incredible films that the Academy did not appreciate. Directed by Joe Wright, the film begins in an English country house where two sisters live: Brionny Tallis, a prodigious aspiring child writer, and her older sister, Cecilia, who has a passion for Robbie, who works at the house and everyone cares a lot. Brionny has a vivid imagination and is convinced, after seeing things she doesn't understand, that Robbie is a dangerous sexual predator. Therefore, when a teenager, visiting the house, is sexually abused by a man that Brionny does not get to see the face of, she swears to have seen Robbie, hiding from everyone that it could not have been him. The lie will haunt her and change the lives of everyone involved, forever. I loved the story of the film, the way it develops is simply delicious and involves the audience until the end. The environments in which everything takes place, from the country house to the fateful beaches of Dunkirk, are the perfect stage for history and the script knows how to save the best for last and surprise when we no longer expect anything. The cast has several well-known names, but it is the young beginner Saiorse Ronan who deserves worth in this film. She has an incredible charisma, she manages to steal all of our attention and direct the film, giving her character a dose of ingenuity mixed with a subtle malice and a premature, but quite marked, maturity. Not far behind, we have an excellent Keira Knightley. She is very gifted for films of this kind, especially if they are set in the past, and has done wonderfully well. James McAvoy is very good and credible in his character, but this is definitely a female film, so he will always be a bit in the shadow of the two actresses I mentioned first. Romola Garai was competent in her work, but even better was Vanessa Redgrave, who closes the film with a flourish by revealing the surprising end of the whole story. Technically, the film is good: cinematography is very elegant and discreet, taking advantage of the colors, light and shadow. Even more notable are the costumes and exquisite settings, where a great effort was made to honor historical rigor and create a genuine environment: from the use of the last ambulances of the time of the World War II, all of them museum pieces today, to the complete transformation of the seafront of a small French town to resemble a chaotic Dunkirk, the production did what it could, and deserves a praise. Although the film won only the Oscar for Best Soundtrack (and in fact it deserved it, with the masterful use of the typewriter sounds in the main melodies), I think it would have perfectly deserved that of Best Art Direction.

Really kicks off great and has wonderful direction. Loses a lot of its steam for me in the middle Robbie war sequences (except the incredible Dunkirk scene).

Atonement is a classic British film. A good cast, an interesting tie, and then a boring narrative and another dull ending follow. James McAvoy played his role perfectly.

Hated this movie. I was surprised at how awful it was considering how much I normally love the actors. Skip this movie. I rarely disagree with my favorite critic, Wall Street Journal's Morgenstern, but I can't see any redeeming qualities in this film

Atonement is a slow, boring and un-compelling film with not a single character that was remotely interesting. Nothing came to life and that's mainly to blame from poor storytelling.