I can't believe I almost forgot to blog about this! I went to see it this weekend while staying with a friend, and while afterwards trying to review it for tripleindemnity, I wasn't sure I could say what I wanted to say without spoiling it. But after further reflection...
My main problem with the film, after having first read the book, is with the casting of the actress who plays cousin Lola. Now, Lola is not one of the main characters, but a very important--the most important--plot point hinges on the fact that she is a fifteen year old girl in the way that those of us who have been fifteen year old girls recognize: not a child, but just on the cusp of womanhood, and aware of that and reaching for it with all the pseudo-sophistication she can summon up. And, in Lola's particular case, this is compounded by being the oldest child in a tumultuous family situation, both pretending she is above being affected by her parents' woes and attempting to take on a quasi-parental role over her younger brothers. The actress who plays Lola in the film unfortunately looks like a baby-faced twelve year old and is unable to project any type of faux worldliness that might overcome that, even if some of her lines (taken, I think, directly from the book's dialogue) are meant to suggest it. It makes what happens to her, plotwise, far less explicable.
My other qualm--and if you remember, this is what I was curious about when I read the book--is now they handled translating the particular literary technique that so surprises you at the end of the book into a film. The answer is: rather clunkily.
All that being said, there's at least one smoking hot scene, and Kiera Knightley looks gorgeous. And I want the green satin dress she wears in that smoking hot scene, even if I would have to lose two cup sizes and grow six inches in order to pull it off.
xoxo
3 comments:
Interesting. I finally saw Atonement and, being unburdened by knowledge of the book, I quite liked the film.
Although I could see where your points could come in, not knowing the book I didn't feel like significant tone or characterization was missing at all. And don't have a clue what literary technique I didn't experience.
Now that I've seen it, you'll have to fill me in!
BTW, although I agree that one scene was hot, Kiera Knightley is waaaaay too skinny and bony for me. That girl needs to go into eating disorders rehab. ;)
See, that's the thing, though. Those satin bias-cut 1930s halter gowns only look right on someone skinny, lanky, and fairly flat-chested. With my body type I could never pull one off. So, really, I should just go back to lusting after Elizabeth Taylor's 1960s underwear. That I could pull off.
:-)
I was actually thinking while watching the film that that style of dress was more 1920s than 1935.
But I'll bow to your superior bosom fashion knowledge.
Just don't go getting any of those missile tit bras in E. Taylor appreciation!
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