I told myself I would never see another Keira Knightley movie after "Pride and Prejudice." But because I have diagnosed myself with "film ADD," I need to see everything. Especialy everything generating some form of critical buzz. I was expecting to be bored to tears. So it is a joy to discover that Atonement, directed by Joe Wright, is every bit as magnificent as some of the best films I've ever seen.
Wright's epic extends deeper than its obvious love story, the soul of the film explores something else entirely: the arrogance and power of the imagination. They have infused the film with this crucial knowledge, and they get every detail exactly right, from the casting and the atmospheric lighting, costumes and set to the understated dialogue, to the direction and cinematography..just everything. The interpretation is so painstaking and moving that almost every moment delivers a shuddering jolt to the head and the heart.Atonement is a story about a dreadful but not wholly innocent mistake, one born of willfulness and inexperience. The drama opens to the relentless clacking of an old-fashioned typewriter -- a sound that resurfaces throughout the soundtrack. The film is full of people typing—a girl writing plays, a man composing apologies, a woman spelling out her guilt in the hope that all can be forgiven—to the point where the pounding of the keys is woven into the very score
At an estate sprawled across the English countryside not far from London, self-important, 13-year-old Briony Tallis, is writing a play. Briony (the fantastic Saoirse Ronan), aims to see her work performed. But the evening does not unfold according to her script: Briony's foolish misinterpretation of events triggers the derailment of the lives of her older sister Cecelia (Keira Knightley) and poor but educated housekeeper's son Robbie Turner (James McAvoy, sexyness)Robbie ends up a soldier in northern France, making his way to the beach for evacuation with the rest of the battered British troops. Wright hammers home his point -- that no one escapes such madness unscathed -- with a breathtaking tracking shot of Robbie and two companions staggering along the beach. Jammed with drunken or half-crazed soldiers awaiting rescue in total chaos, the beach scene provides a nightmarish, visual counterpoint in ugly contrast to the earlier, innocent scenes of youthful possibility.
Still, Atonement remains a film in which small things weigh heavily, such as fragments of speech -- a whispered ''Come back. Come back to me,'' a ''I saw him with my own eyes'' -- or the hush just before Keira and James fall hungrily into each other or the agonizing pauses in Briony's explanation of herself at the film's end. The elder Briony is played by Vanessa Redgrave, whose riveting presence adds to this finely acted miracle of a film.
The film also raises important questions about the relationship between between memory and wishful thinking, and it ends on a surprisingly powerful note that asks whether there can ever be true mercy without, well, truth. Can one find redemption in a lie, if it is told with kindness? Atonement seems to be about people who cannot let go of the past, and are haunted by the past and their knowledge that it can never be undone. Briony, in particular, is searching for forgiveness, and the fact that she can't quite find it makes Atonement one of the more devastating films in recent memory.
A
Juno
The protagonist character in Juno, a pregnant 16-year-old played with impressive verbal dexterity and heart by Ellen Page, speaks in quips and geeky references, and surrounds herself with ironic accessories like a hamburger phone and a plastic pipe. She seems on the surface the picture of carelessness, and her pregnancy by sort-of boyfriend Bleeker played by the always adorable Michael Cera, serves as the ultimate symbol of her inability to take life seriously. About 15 minutes into the film, in the funny, touching scene where she finally spills the news to her parents (wonderfully played by J.K. Simmons and Allison Janney), that first impression turns out to be entirely false. Yes, she has a snarky, above-it-all attitude, but irony is her protective shield, masking the fear, vulnerability, and compassion lurking just under the surface. She'll make a great mother someday, just not now. Or maybe she won't make a good mother, whatever.
Written by newcomer Diablo Cody, Juno will get a lot of attention for its colorful dialogue, which is at times too much for its own good, but the film's sincerity is what ultimately carries it across. Set in the indie town of Wherever, U.S.A.—Cody and director Jason Reitman go a little overboard in this regard—the film opens with Page burning through pregnancy tests, trying to shake off a "plus" sign as if, the store clerk says, she were handling an Etch-A-Sketch. She initially considers an abortion, but instead decides to give the baby up for adoption, with the consent of its perpetually awestruck father Michael Cera. Page finds a willing couple in yuppies Jennifer Garner and Jason Bateman, but as she perhaps unwisely insinuates herself into their lives, she discovers some issues in their marriage.
Garner and Bateman's characters are drawn a bit too broadly—she's the henpecking, Type A, overeager supermom-to-be; he's the whipped sellout who loves Sonic Youth, and still dreams of being a rock star—but the actors do a fine job wriggling out of caricature. Garner, in particular, has found the right role to capitalize on her high-strung, hyper-driven screen persona; her excitement over being a mother would be overbearing if it weren't also so heartbreakingly sincere. That's Juno's appeal in a nutshell: It comes off as calculatedly irreverent at times, and its Juno-isms are a little too precious, but its sweetness is genuine and next-to-impossible to resist.It's got enough heart to keep the comedic elements in check. When I was done smiling at the perfect ending scene, the movie gave me something to think about, as well: Where were girls like this when I was in high school? Someone like Juno would have been fantastic.
B+
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