ATONEMENT

Director: Joe Wright

Stars: James McAvoy, Keira Knightley, Saoirse Ronan, Juno Temple, Romola Garai

Year: 2007

Rating: R

A moving, beautifully-crafted and ultimately satisfying film (even with its less-than-upbeat ending, or even storyline), Atonement is a fine example of filmmaking that contains two terrific performances by James McAvoy and the (deservedly so) Oscar-nominated Saoirse Ronan.

The film opens in 1935, on the brilliant Ronan as 13-year-old Briony Tallis - an aspiring writer of stories who has just completed her first play. Briony is an introspective, serious girl who tends to take charge of things, and lives with her well-to-do family in the English countryside. She's already had a crush on the handsome gardener, Robbie (James McAvoy) - the son of the mansion's housekeeper - for a couple of years, but soon learns on this day that her older sister Cecilia (Keira Knightley, really stunning here) seems to be beginning a fledgling relationship with Robbie. In fact, when Robbie gives Briony a note to give to Cecilia - a note he accidentally put into the envelope instead of the one he intended to go to her - the nosy Briony reads the note herself ... and that triggers a series of events that ends with Briony accusing Robbie of a horrible crime he did not commit, even though she may really think he did (though that may mostly be due to her jealousy).

Several lives are destroyed with this accusation, and the rest of the film is both Briony's story - of guilt and shame, as she grows older and realizes the truth at last - and the romance of Robbie and Cecilia, as Robbie is forced to serve in the army in order to escape jail, and heads off to France to fight in World War II, all the while longing to both be reunited with Cecilia and clear his name.

To say more would be to reveal too much, but know that everything in the film - from direction to acting to cinematography to costume design to the Oscar-winning musical score - works on a nearly flawless level. The film is compelling, heartbreaking, suspenseful, a bit shocking, and very real in nearly every detail. Ronan is amazing as the young Briony, utterly convincing to the point you'd like to ring her neck for what she's done, and if ever a casting director wondered whether James McAvoy's talent and charisma could carry a film - wonder no more. Keira Knightley adds the right blend of passion and pathos to Cecilia, never overacting in a role it would have been so easy to do so in - and even Juno Temple, as the young cousin Lola, heads a fine supporting cast that help make an already great film work.

The storyline jumps back and forth in time a bit, so this IS a film you can't have on without watching it all the way through - no chatting or leaving the room while it's playing - but then again, it's the kind of film that draws you in and holds you with its story and characters, so that shouldn't be a problem. Atonement is both a film of love and war ... but maybe more, a film that questions whether there are some wrongs - horrible, ghastly wrongs - that can ever be righted again. ****1/2 - Reel Awesome-Reel Must-See