Healthy Living Books DVD

Rating: - Exceptionally disappointing
Having read all reviews of this film but not having the opportunity to go to the cinema, I eventually rented the DVD. At the end of the film, I was glad I didn't pay to go to the cinema. In fact, I thought it was a waste of money to pay for the DVD rental as well.

The film is so painfully slow that you can dip in and out of it and you won't miss a thing. Keira Knightley is very pretty as always but she doesn't do a lot in this film. James McAvoy is great but he doesn't do a lot either. In fact, none of the characters leave any lasting impression at all.

There is no real chemistry between McAvoy and Knightley, which is crucial for this sort of film considering that there is almost no dialogue and almost no action.

I've not read the book and it might well be better than the film. My advice would be if you want to buy the book, don't watch this film beforehand. It will put you off.

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Rating: - Excellent, but read the book also.
I can't remember a film having entranced me so much since "Killing Fields" and I can't explain why. I saw the film first and even though I found it very enjoyable, I felt something was missing. I read the book as soon as I could afterwards and then it made much more sense. The director has made one of the most accurate adaptations of novel into film that I've ever seen, but has failed to capture or portray properly some of the minor points which add to the tragedy.

For instance, in the film Briony is seen searching through someone's belongings, but it's not clear whose (in the book, we know it's Cecelia's)for the obscene letter sent by Robbie by mistake (again, in the film it's not very clear what she's searching for). For me, this is the pivotal moment in the story. Briony has already committed the unforgivable crime of opening her sister's private correspondence and then compounds the felony by rifling through her sister's possessions to find the "incriminating" letter to show to her mother and thence the police.

This point is important, because, as one other reviewer has pointed out, Briony's accusation of Robbie sexually assaulting her 15-year-old cousin might not have held as much weight on its own. But the letter, containing as it did possibly the most obscene word anyone could use back in pre-war England, would probably have clinched Robbie's conviction. The word in question certainly got me into serious trouble as a child back in the 50s (Ian McEwan is the same age as me, so he would remember its shock value, even post-war).

Nevertheless, I am fascinated by both the film and the book. This may be because for me Briony never achieves atonement for her crime. By the way, I was so wrapped-up in the film that I never even noticed the (in)famous Dunkirk tracking shot. And despite any historical inaccuracies I will doubtless watch it again.

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Rating: - A 'Go-Between' for the half-witted...
God, I hated this. A 'British' film in the worst possible sense, reminiscent of those ghastly Stephen Poliakoff country house dramas that the BBC seem to feel obliged to show every few months - corpse-stiff, utterly unconvincing, deep and meaningless. Dreadful plot too - the coda is one short step from 'it was all a dream', looks like a lift from 'Titanic' (and how desperate is that) and is completely valueless anyway (apart from allowing Vanessa Redgrave to remind us what proper acting looks like). So you made it all up? It's all fiction anyway isn't it? What's your point? Leaden with cliches ... those gorblimey squaddies, oh dear... and that whole plot twist (such as it was) on him writing THE C WORD in a letter was just puerile, crude, vulgar and incongruous. Zero chemistry between Knightley and McAvoy of course (McAvoy appeared to be, rightly, perspiring with shame throughout), though it's hard to imagine chemistry between Kiera Knightley and anything with a pulse (thought her Celia Johnson impression was quite funny though).

Nothing in its favour? Well, it looked all right I suppose, if you like that kind of thing. Apart from the rather stupid tracking shot at Dunkirk, which was completely out of character with the rest of the film and had the same effect as subtitles coming up reading 'you're watching a film, you know'.

Summary: I'd say twaddle, if that didn't make it sound like quite good fun. More than anything it reminded me of a witless remake of 'The Go-Between' but completely lacking that film's heart and soul. What seems tragic to me is not how far our capability to make a British film has descended since those days (we still make good films from time to time), but how far our critical sensibilities have slipped that this kind of trite, shoddy rubbish can be acclaimed and nominated for awards.

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Rating: - A Lie
Dont believe the hype as this cinematic "must-see" is everywhere and it has the effect of sending the average critic stumbling to his thesaurus in search of gushing adjectives that all but close the book on the Oscar race. The time and setting of such a movie can vary, of course, as can the talent involved, but to a film, we are assured that here, in the dark, we will witness a true epic; a masterpiece of sweeping grandeur and lush, aching beauty that comes but once in a generation. Maybe this will be better than the last great British Classic: The English Patient. Not a chance. The English Patient was in a different league.

There is Cecilia (Knightley), a spoiled, obscenely wealthy nitwit, and at what point we are meant to identify with her is beyond any sound judgment. We soon learn that she is empty, shallow, and bordering on caricature.

That a child's lies could ruin lives is an interesting premise, I suppose, but it seems more than a trifle that we should be at least partly concerned about the lives in question. We know nothing of Briony except that she is a budding writer seemingly lost in the recesses of her imagination, and one who just might be punishing her sister for being more attractive and outgoing. But if spite is her motivation, it's not as interesting that she later writes the novel she does (the "atonement" of the title), for why not attempt to justify her crimes through fiction?

Atonement is a flat, emotionless void in opposition to each and every idea it might accidentally encounter. Without the flow of the written word, this is a trite, humbug of a story; one that includes a wicked tracking shot through the chaos of Dunkirk for no other reason than to bring a shot of life to the proceedings which only serves to highlight an abundance of weakness with but a single moment of strength !!!!

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Rating: - What a load of rubbish
I rented this film with high expectations having read lots of positive reviews and its oscar nominations etc. However I was hugely dissapointed. The storyline was clunky and disjointed and there was no character development. The constant winding forward and back in time was irritating and pointless. The development of the enduring love story of the film consisted of a few furtive glances and a quick poke in the library. James McEvoy was wooden as the farmhand raised as a toff. His war experiences comprised him wandering around France aimlessly with some guy following calling him guv. I'm not sure if the "Titanic" style ending was meant to surprise or not but it left me feeling cheated out of 2 hours I'd have more usefully spent picking my toes.