An overblown rose

Rating: 8/10 (20 January 2008)

War-torn romance is almost its own subgenre of drama. Though we feel we've seen it all, Atonement still has some fresh ideas to deliver. The film is a bouquet of imagery, and gathers three interesting stories into something of a twisted love triangle. Atonement's narrative may be too familiar, and often rushes past the point of empathy, but the movie is so beautiful that we can forgive some of these faults.
Briony (Saoirse Ronan) is a serious storyteller on the cusp of ladyhood. She lives with her uninhibited older sister Cecilia (Knightley) on a large estate in the English country. Cecilia is in academic competition with a servant's son, Robbie (McAvoy), as both are attending medical school with support from Cecilia's father. Briony's imagination runs wild when she thinks she sees Robbie commit a horrible crime. Her testimony condemns Robbie to prison, and leads to his involvement in WWII.
Atonement is most interesting when Briony's story is explored. She's a very smart girl, but not altogether perfect - a little too prim and prone to jealousy. But Briony is also fiercely loyal and protective of her friends. We can't completely love her, but we admire her complexity. Hers is a story of the confusion and dark dawn of adolescence, and her actions drive the rest of the film.
Cecilia is something of a rebel - proud and sharp-tongued. I'm not a Kiera fan, but I enjoy her feisty, nonchalant performance through most of the movie. Robbie is cocky but highly sentimental. They're practically made for each other, and as you can guess from the posters, they fall in love before Robbie is sent to jail and war. This is where the movie starts to lose us.
When the lovers are apart, we experience their generalized pain and longing, but it all feels like an outline instead of a heart-felt exploration. So much attention is given to the images of war and suffering, the costumes and despairing gazes, that we can't fully sympathize. This is complicated by how quickly their relationship develops, only to be torn and kept separate through most of the movie. We can't reminisce and sigh about the times they had together - there weren't many. We don't feel what they're going through, because it's mostly done in silence against highly glorified images of war. Their actions aren't especially telling. The misty looks to the horizon speak for themselves, but say little more than "this sucks, I want to go home." There are several parts of this film that lead me to believe that it's severely abridged from the novel. The secondary characters are nearly perfunctory, and one even pops on screen for a meaningful conversation with seemingly no context. Briony and Cecilia's parents are mostly absent. The lovers meet during the war, but how they found each other or why they're separated again isn't entirely clear. Five important years of Briony's life vanish. We don't have much trouble connecting the past to the present, but it's nowhere near as developed as it should be.
However, the art of the film is very well established. All of the pre-war scenes glow white and are rich with pastels and florals. Briony always appears in white and is backlit through the movie for an ethereal innocence. The shots are all highly composed and symmetrical, with careful attention to the beautiful architecture and room design. When passion is introduced, twilight falls, colors become richer and deeper, and images are blurred. Montage is so prevalent, it's almost overused. There's a tracking shot of Robbie on the French beach with thousands of English soldiers waiting for boats to retreat home - the chaos and comedy of war is explored in this lengthly, dense footage bathed in brown and gold. Beyond the costumes and colors, the sound plays a pleasantly important part in the film. Briony's scenes are accompanied by the calculated clacks of percussion and typewriters. Scenes across oceans are connected by a thread of melody. Montage music dissolves into sounds of the next scene. These techniques may be considered too overt, but the were a joy for me.
Atonement has its flaws, and I can see why some would spurn it completely. There are romantic clichés. There is not enough time given to building the romance. The ending is completely unsatisfying and gimmicky. But we're so cynical and well-versed as an audience that it's difficult to please, and nearly impossible to show us anything new without us assuming it's a trick to gain our favor. The primary focus of the film seems to be the art - I'm happy enough to hear a story that doesn't overshadow or detract from that stunning cinema.