Second-rate film-making, at best.

Rating: 3/10 (28 April 2008)

I watched this on DVD last night expecting great things. I should have known better. At the root of the problem is the rather weak and implausible plot. Then we have characters that are verging on stereotypes (the effing squaddie was one of the worst). Add in some confusing jumbling of the time sequence - presumably an attempt at 'originality' - and dreary, portentous music that a) drowns out dialogue, b) tries, but fails, to inject some emotion into the events being portrayed on the screen. Sprinkle with historical inaccuracies, a pretentious conclusion (are we supposed to buy the idea that the novelist can literally 'write off' his or her appalling actions by making up happy endings?) and clunking references to scenes far better done elsewhere (murky goings on in ponds - 'Don't Look Now'; beach warfare tableaux -'Saving Private Ryan'; in front of the black-and-white cinema screen -'Brief Encounter; etc)- and the result is a terrible mess! Joe Wright's acknowledged admiration of Celia Johnson and 'Brief Encounter' seems to have encouraged him to believe he can be the new David Lean. On this showing he isn't, no more than Ian McEwan is today's Noel Coward. Liked the colour photography though!