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Summary Atonement Film Study Notes
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Complete notes on the Atonement film study. Chaacter breakdowns, plot summary and film analysis.
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AtonementBackground
● 2007 British Romantic Drama film
● Directed : Joe Wright
● Based : Atonement novel by Ian McEwan
Storyline
● We star out at the Tallis family’s very upper-class English home in 1935, a few years before
World War 2
● The family is expecting a visit from their maternal cousins - the young twins Jackson &
Pierrot, & 15-year-old Lola - all of whom have been temporarily cast adrift by their parents’
divorce
● The Tallis family is also expecting a visit from brother Leon & his friend, the chocolate
magnate, Paul
● With five people arriving, the house is in something of an uproar - especially since father
Jack Tallis is off in London at his government job, while mother Emily Tallis is largely
incapacitated with a migrane
● In the middle of all of this burble & bustle, Robbie, the son of the housekeeper, realizes that
he’s fallen hopelessly, passionately in love with his childhood friend Cecilia
● Their courtship rituals result - as these things will - in a series of awkward sexual displays
● Cecilia jumps into a fountain in her underwear
● Robbie accidentally give Cecilia a letter he meant to destroy in which he tells her exactly
what he wants to do with her
● Then they do some of those things, not nearly privately enough, in the family library
● These embarrassing events are witnessed by Briony, Cecilia’s imaginative 13-year-old sister
● Spurred by confusion, & by her penchant for making upi stories, she decides that Robbie is a
“sex maniac” eho is after her sister
● This results in disaster when the twins run away after dinner, & everyone races out to search
for them in the dark
● Briony finds Lola, who has been sexually assaulted, & sees a figure running away into the
darkness
● Though she does not see his face, she is convinced that is was Robbie, & accuses him to the
police
● Robbie is taken to prison, despite the protests of Grace (his mother) & Cecilia, who pledges
her love & promises to wait for him
● The novel now jumps several years to WW2
● Robbie has been released from prison to join the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) fighting in
France against the Nazis
● The war has gone horribly though, & se Robbie is trudging cross-country to the sea at
France, where he, his companions Mace & Nettle, & the rest of the British hope to be ferried
across to Dunkirk & safety
● Robbie is wounded & increasingly delirious
, ● He is sustained only by letters from Cecilia & his hopes for their future together
● He finally collapses into sleep, waiting for the evacuation which is to begin the next day
● The narrative shifts to Briony
● She is riddled with guilt since she knows that it wasn’t Robbie who raped Lola
● In part to try to atone for what she has done, she refuses to go study st Cambridge
● Instead, to her mother’s shock, she becomes a training nurse in London, where she cares for
some of the first British soldiers wounded in the war
● On one of her days off from the hospital. Briony visits her sister & offers to tell their parents
& the court that her statement about Robbie was false
● She discovers Robbie, who has survived the Dunkirk crossing, staying in her sister’s
apartment - scandal!
● Though it seems unlikely that Robbie’s verdict can be overturned, she promises to retract
her statement before an official witness, to tell their parents, & to write them a full account
of what she did & why
● She also tells them that Paul had married Lola, & that it was almost certainly he who had
raped her
● Cecilia & Robbiedo not forgive her, since she did ruin their lives & it’s hard to get past that
● But there is some sense of reconciliation
● The final part of the movie is narrated by Briony in first person
● She is old now, & a famous author
● She has just learned that she has vascular dementia, a condition which lead her to senility &
the death in a couple years
● We learn that the book - Atonement in her novel, & that she is waiting to publish it until Lord
& Lady Marshall - Paul & Lola - are dead & cannot sue
● She recognize that she will not outlive Lola, & that the book will therefore not be released in
her lifetime
● She also reveals that the book is not entirely truthful, & that Robbie & Cecilia did not reunite
but instead died separately during the war
● Although the film audience is given a traditional happy-ending, it does lack the satisfaction of
a conventional happy-ending
● Its purpose serves to remind the viewer that the ending is a fantasy
Narrative Structure of the Film
● Non-linear narrative
● Does not follow rules of space & time
● Plotline jumps around
Metafiction
● Occurs fictional stories when elements of fiction appears
● Used to explore relationship between literature & reality
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