Brilliant.

Rating: 10/10 (5 April 2008)

It took me a long time to get interested in watching Atonement, even after it was so well received at the Oscars. Recently I watched the first 20 minutes or so and was immediately put off by the atmosphere and the characters ("I've been going completely doolally up here!"), for exactly the same reason that I am generally put off by books like The Great Gatsby or Faulkner's The Sun Also Rises, which feature characters of such wealth that their biggest problem seems to be what to do with all their surplus money and leisure time. Such people are difficult for me to relate to.
For a couple weeks I put the movie aside and couldn't get up the interest to watch it, until finally I did and now I realize why it was one of the best pictures of 2007. Keira Knightly, a clearly talented actor who, for some reason, almost never impresses me, plays the daughter from a wealthy family living in the beautiful English countryside just before World War II, and James MacEvoy plays the daughter of a man working for her family. He is a promising and educated young man, but the son of a housekeeper nonetheless, so clearly a romantic relationship between the two would be highly taboo.
The first 30 minutes or so of the movie depict a life devoid of trouble or worries, and yet still manages to create an atmosphere of slight tension about the war that we can almost feel approaching somewhere beyond the edge of the screen. Before long, Cecilia's (Knightly) 13- year-old sister sees a couple of things happening and makes some dangerous assumptions followed by some increasingly dangerous accusations, and radically alters the lives of her sister, Robbie (MacEvoy), and herself.
The three main characters, from this point on, have remarkably little control over their own lives, reminding me of the struggles of the main character in Kubrick's brilliant film Barry Lyndon. The unusually structure of the film allows us to explore the results of a few catastrophic days in the lives of these three people and how they affected the rest of their lives.
The film covers the course of many decades, tells a stunning and moving story, and never once comes off as pretentious or cheesy or preachy, even in the closing scene, which shows Briony, Cecilia's sister, as an aged novelist giving an interview about how that one decision during her childhood has affected her life. This is a story about life and how we affect those around us, particularly those closest to us, even when we think we're doing the best thing for them. One IMDb reviewer calls it "pure poetry on film," and it's not easy to think of a more accurate description.
Note: There is a scene in the film where Robbie comes across a horribly grisly scene in the woods during his military service. The following close-up of his face is one of the best pieces of acting I have seen in many years...