ATONEMENT: Not your Oscar winner

by: bamf 6 months, 4 weeks, 2 days, 7 hours, 48 minutes ago

 

Bamf here rematerializing from the void..

In my estimation, Atonement is not a love story.  Rather it is a tale of accelerated lives in extraordinary times.  It shows the illusion of perception, and the power of words, or a word.  After a false charge of rape is brought upon Robbie (James McAvoy) by Cecilia’s (Kiera –feed me- Knightley) 13 year old sister Briony, Robbie enlists in the service of the army after spending three years in prison for a crime he did not commit.  His life hangs in the balance of a war about to be lost.  It’s 1940, and Hitler is pushing ahead full steam.  The back of Europe is about to be broken, as forces are pushed back west towards the Atlantic.  Robbie’s fate seems dire, all because of a little girl with fancies of being a writer.

The structure of Joe Wright’s direction on this works well enough as an adaption of Ian McEwan’s novel.  The stylelized juxtaposition of what Briony sees, versus what really is happening keeps things fresh in the mind.  Once I was deep in the second act though the “go back” device of storytelling started to wear thin on me.  Dario Marianelli’s original music is quite good, and has this subdued Felix Mendelssohn quality to it all (with flair!). The evacuation of Dunkirk has to be one of the most memorable scenes of 2007.  It’s a nearly five minute tracking shot of the beach in Dunkirk France being used to evacuate English and French soldiers in a race against the land and air advancing German army.  This was one of the pivotal points of turn during World War II.  Winston Churchill was calling for American involvement; British production of war supplies was being negated by a day’s war time loss.  For example, during the air battle over France, 453 aircraft had been manufactured, but 436 were shot down.  Retreat was on the mind of everyone recoiling in Europe.  A few days after the Dunkirk evacuation Churchill made his famous “We will fight them” speech to the House of Commons—at which one referred it to being “worth 1000 guns and the speeches of 1000 years”.  Another said to the speech, ‘…like a great fortress: they are never words for words’ sake.’ I digress a little into history, but I’ve been reading a lot about Churchill over this past year, so my apologies.  The Dunkirk scene is as depressing as the story in whole.  And like my last quotation, this downward spiral of Robbie was all sparked by a word that was not said for a word’s sake.

Bad super naughty you-wouldnt-say-this-to-your-mother word to follow from here.

Cunt is one powerful word in the English language.  It’s in our vernacular, yet rarely do we ever see it used.  The negative consequences of one’s use of the word cunt makes my mind spin in rejection like the mention of a certain racial slur; but I cannot think of a public apology or a civil lawsuit that has ever come from the consequences of its use.  In this culture, we give wide berth to the word cunt.  Robbie uses it as a word to paint this primal need to taste his fleeting desire, Cecilia.  That letter reaches Cee by accident, and because Briony reads it, in turn sparks the false accusations that she later will tell.  There is something hot and sensual going on between Robbie and Cecilia, but I was never convinced that it was love.  To me they were two people that had risen through adolescence into sexual maturity.  And when once friends, now with experience behind them they had this burning desire to answer that “what would it be like” question.  It is the events of the rape, the war, and the fall that throws them into this –might as well be you—cycle.  This is a cynical take, but I feel they were victims of their time and circumstance. Had things been different, they most likely would have had their sex, and then moved right along.

The standout in this film for performance as well as character was the now 18 year old Briony played by the cheerless Romola Garai.  Her depression and need to atone is as visceral as the injuries of the soldiers she attempts to comfort.  Her performance of Briony is however undermined by the screenplay in the ending of Atonement.  Having not read the book of basis, I cannot say this for certain.  But the last scene which by an elderly Briony’s own admission is a work of fantasy works against everything the film had built up to.  This is a depressing, gun in the mouth type film.  Instead of leaving on the dour note that the film wallow’s in for 120 minutes; the film maker’s balk by making it leave on a tidy albeit cynical happy ending note.  Having Robbie and Cecilia frolic through the lapping waves of their idealized meeting grounds was a very poor choice.  If you set out to make a sad and depressing film, own it people. From this armchair, showing an empty sea cliff house that never entertained visitors would have been well enough for me.  Instead they cheapened it all with an ending that matched nothing that preceded it.

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