Excellent .....................****
Very Good .....................***
Good ...............................**
Fair ..................................*
Poor ...................... No Stars

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This Christmas
***
Skeletons Aplenty In Dysfunctional Family Dramedy

A Beleaguered Critic Gets Even
The 10 Worst Films of 2007
By Kam Williams

When your job is to review movies, you can’t just bolt out of the theater as soon as you can tell that a film is a turkey. No, you have to sit there and endure the dumb dialogue, the horrible editing, the offensive stereotyping, the implausible plot twists and the awful performances from start to finish. Fortunately, at the end of the year, I am afforded this opportunity to even the score by venting on those high crimes against cinema which tended to test my patience. 

1. Who’s Your Caddy?     
When a new, black-owned Hollywood studio bills itself as being dedicated to making wholesome family films presenting positive portrayals of African-Americans, excuse me for expecting more of the company’s much ballyhooed introductory release than Who’s Your Caddy? The most degrading, minstrel coon show since Soul Plane, this relentlessly-crass exercise in self-hatred is little more than a non-stop attempt to portray black folks in the worst possible light.
From its demeaning dialogue sprinkled with the N-word, the S-word and the P-word, to yet another brother romping around in a skirt, to a sister female proudly referring to herself as a “queen b*tch,” to the celebration of drug abuse, indiscriminate sex and conspicuous consumption, one can only cringe when wondering what quality of fare might be next on Our Stories Films’ agenda. Regardless, its disgraceful debut release was an easy pick as the worst of the worst of the year.

2. License to Wed
Every skit flops in this groan-inducing Robin Williams vehicle where he plays an annoying man of the cloth. Believe it or not, this star vehicle is even worse than Man of the Year, which made my 10 Worst List for 2006.
Who knows whether Williams has lost his talent entirely or has merely lowered his standards to foist as many take-the-money-and-run rip-offs on the public as possible till his fans catch on? Regardless, this picture is so pathetic that an un-credited Wanda Sykes is funnier in a quickie cameo than its star is during his 90 minutes of screen time.
Looks like Robin Williams has replaced Cuba Gooding, Jr. as the kiss of death on the set of any comedy.

3. Daddy Day Camp
Speaking of Cuba Gooding, Jr., he made a persuasive case to keep his crown as the perennial “King of the Bomb” with this sorry sequel to Daddy Day Care. I’m not going to bring up all his bad movies. The problem this time starts with his presuming to fill the shoes of Eddie Murphy, who opted not to reprise the lead role of Charlie Hinton.
It doesn’t help that Cuba has no sense of comedic timing and that he’s only further crippled by an abysmal script consisting of a series of disconnected sketches featuring misbehaving little monsters who keep him up to his eyeballs in feces, cooties, bus crashes, flatulence, projectile vomit, poison ivy, swift kicks to the crotch, urine balloons and wedgies. An utterly predictable, unfunny, infantile test of patience and waste of ninety minutes of my life I can never get back.
Whatever happened to the once-promising who won an Oscar for shouting Show me the money?
Show me the exit!

4. I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry
Adam Sandler and Kevin James ought to be ashamed to be associated with the cinematic equivalent of gay bashing. Not only are homosexuals repeatedly referred to by such slurs as “faggots,” “queers,” and “fruits,” but this relentlessly hateful and superficial enterprise seizes on any excuse to equate homosexuality with effeminacy and with certain superficial stereotypical tastes and traits.
When not trashing gays, the film goes after Asians with impunity, by associating them with thick accents and thick eyeglasses, and by portraying this ethnic group’s females as subservient sex objects. Overall, this flick is so evilly executed that it deserves to be dismissed as a deliberately mean-spirited indulgence in intolerance. 

5. Code Name: The Cleaner
This movie was one of those pump-and-dump productions which puts all the best jokes in the trailers, hoping to milk the most it can opening weekend before word of mouth spreads. So, if you caught the commercial where Cedric the Entertainer explains his wearing clogs and lederhosen with “Haven’t you heard of Dutch chocolate?” before yodeling “Ricola!” then you’re already familiar with the film’s funniest scene.
Less amusing is the endlessly demeaning dialogue, like when Jake declines a job offer as an FBI Agent, opting to remain a janitor because ”Somebody needs to keep this place clean. That’s what I do.” Just as bad is Niecy Nash as a harridan heard complaining “A sister’s not happy if her hair’s nappy,”
Made we want to set myself on fire in protest, like a Buddhist monk.

6. Perfect Stranger
Not even the screen chemistry of Halle Berry and Bruce Willis could save this pretentious whodunit with an infuriatingly convoluted plot patently unfair to its audience. Be forewarned that that the movie offers next to no clues to unraveling its mystery before hastily divulging the solution during the denouement almost as an afterthought.
The film’s fatal flaw is that the over-plotted production introduces too many characters, especially given that virtually every one of them might be a suspect. Laced with an abundance of rather obvious red herrings, the twists and turns actually could have been laughable, had the picture been packaged as a deliberately mediocre, tongue-in-cheek homage to bad detective flicks of a bygone era.
Your low expectations of this lost cause will be richly rewarded.

7. Because I Said So
Diane Keaton is still relying on that ever less-endearing assortment of addlepated antics which won her an Academy Award for Annie Hall back in 1978. Now that she’s in her sixties, that girlish flustered act is wearing a bit thin. And having her parade around in panties and crinoline party skirts isn’t fooling anybody into thinking she’s a teenager, either.
This May-December romantic comedy might have worked were it not for Keaton’s infuriating dumbing herself down and mugging for the camera in a desperate attempt to prove she’s terminally-cute in a pre-feminism sort of way. 
Unfortunately, she was only encouraged by the Oscar nomination she landed in 2004 for Something’s Gotta’ Give, where she played a post-menopausal playwright opposite the ever-impish Jack Nicholson.
But best to avoid this cliché-ridden rip-off of that relatively-pleasant romp. Why? Because I said so.

8. Kickin’ It Old Skool
Jamie Kennedy stars in this fish-out-of-water comedy about middle-aged man who emerges from a 20-year coma still having a boy’s brain after landing on his head while break dancing as an adolescent. The story revolves around his tracking down the three other members of his pre-teen posse, The Funky Fresh Boys, to see if they’re ready to resume their routines.
Truly an equal opportunity offender, the dialogue repeatedly resorts to ethnic, gender and other assorted slurs, whether referring to blacks by the N-word repeatedly; calling Asians gooks, geisha girls or egg rolls; calling females bitches, hos or pink sushi, calling gays homo, calling the mentally-challenged retarded, or associating Jews with several stereotypes.
Not one scene of this disgusting shocksploit is either entertaining or funny, proof being its failure to elicit even one laugh out of anyone at the screening this critic attended. Another negative is the picture’s profusion of prominent placement ads for Pepsi, Nike, Apple, Pop Rocks, etcetera, and equally-distracting cameos by David Hasselhoff, Erik Estrada, Rowdy Roddy Piper and Emmanuelle “Webster” Lewis who has my permission to return to obscurity after embarrassing himself by calling a woman a “ho” before slapping her right on the rump.

9. I Think I Love My Wife
Can a seemingly-irresistible seductress tempt a happily-married man to break his marriage vows? That was the driving question behind Chloe in the Afternoon, Eric Rohmer’s thought-provoking morality play exploring infidelity. This adaptation was directed by its star Chris Rock, who also overhauled the script into a barely-recognizable, formulaic sitcom.
Forget about the palpable tension created in the original by the protagonist’s predicament, since this transparent tale takes his cues from its spoiler of a title. So, everybody knows from the beginning which of the ladies in this love triangle will ultimately prevail.
Worse is the fact that the picture isn’t funny and consists mostly of vaguely familiar scenes borrowed from a variety of popular screen adventures. This rip-off even has the nerve to recreate the seduction from The Graduate, complete with the famous silhouette of the raised leg featured in that classic’s poster. In sum, an uncreative, unoriginal exercise in the obvious.
I think I hated this movie.

10. Reign over Me    
This relentlessly depressing buddy flick focuses on the toll that 9-11 has taken on a defrocked dentist, played by Adam Sandler, whose wife and three daughters died on an airplane that fateful day. The movie begs to be appreciated as a cerebral, character-driven meditation on the psyche of America in the aftermath of the terror attacks, but it resorts far too frequently to the staples of the Sandler formula to be considered of any more substance or consequence than The Waterboy, Happy Gilmore or even Billy Madison.
Instead of relying on a protagonist’s mental retardation to rationalize his familiar lowbrow brand of humor, he exploits a tragedy to free his character to launch politically-incorrect bile in the direction of Latinos, gays and any other easy targets unfortunate enough to cross his path. Just a meanspirited, frivolous, brutally-dull, pretentious indulgence in bigotry and sophomoric behavior in the name of Al-Qaeda.

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Movie reviews and interviews by Kam Williams

                           
Honeydripper
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Danny Glover Stars in Saga Set in Segregated South 

It is 1950, in Harmony, a hardscrabble Alabama town whose name gives no hint that its color-coded caste system relegates blacks to second-class status. Despite the limitations of living under oppressive Jim Crow segregation, Tyrone “Pinetop” Purvis (Danny Glover) has managed to eke out a decent living, at least till now.
He’s the proprietor of the Honeydripper Lounge, a juke joint which flourished during its heyday by selling cheap booze while catering to the tastes of a clientele which appreciated the blues. However, the establishment has failed to adapt to the changing times. Consequently, the bulk of Pinetop’s business has drifted over to its prime competitor, a shady shack featuring performers of a new genre of music that’s a precursor to R&B.
Finding himself on the brink of bankruptcy, Tyrone decides to book an out-of-town act in a last gasp effort to save the nightclub. Unfortunately, Guitar Sam fails to arrive on the train from New Orleans as arranged. So, the embattled owner comes up with the bright idea of hiring a drifter, Sonny Blake (Gary Clark, Jr.) to impersonate the legendary guitarist, since nobody knows what he looks like, anyway.
This is the overarching premise of the Honeydripper, the latest offbeat offering from the iconoclastic John Sayles. The front story of this music-driven, costume drama is curiously less compelling than the picture’s electrifying score and wince-inducing recreations of tableaus of a bygone era marked by subjugation and intolerance.
For example, we see how the hobo Sonny, upon his arrival in Harmony, is arrested on the spot by racist Sheriff Pugh (Stacy Keach), who charges the stranger with “gawking with intent to mope.”  Without benefit of a lawyer or trial, the young vagrant is convicted by Judge Gatlin (Danny Vinson) who takes personal custody of the young man and puts him to work on his farm without pay, and indefinitely.
Sadly, such routine mistreatment and exploitation of blacks represents a generally unacknowledged aspect of America’s legacy. Ordinarily, a subject of nature is only touched upon humorously in cinema, ala Life, the Southern chain gang comedy co-starring Martin Lawrence and Eddie Murphy.
Danny Glover’s engaging turn as the protagonist of Honeydripper is matched by the equally-measured performances by Charles S. Dutton, Lisa Gay Hamilton, Vondie Curtis-Hall, Mary Steenburgen, Kel Mitchell, Sean Patrick Thomas and YaYa DaCosta. Plus, the production has been blessed with country cred courtesy of some gifted blues musicians, such as Keb Mo’ and Mable John, whose talents add immeasurably to the comfy auditory ambience.
Kudos to two-time Oscar-nominee Sayles (for Lone Star and Passion Fish) who has tackled themes of interest to the African-American community previously, both in his comic cult classic Brother from Another Planet and in the relatively cerebral Sunshine State. Here, he’s to be commended for again serving up a thought-provoking slice of African-Americana sans the shucking and jiving which Hollywood typically attaches to black-oriented fare.    

Rating: PG-13 for brief violence and suggestive material.
Running time: 123 minutes
Studio: Emerging Pictures

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Charlie Wilson's War
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Bio-Pic Has Hanks as Texas Congressman Single-Handedly Toppling the Soviet Union

Have you ever hear of Congressman Charlie Wilson (Tom Hanks), who served Texas’ 2nd District from 1973 to 1996? Neither had I, despite the fact that he was virtually single-handedly responsible for toppling the Soviet Union. Apparently, it was through his funding of a covert CIA operation in response to the Russian invasion of Afghanistan that the mujahedeen managed to defend themselves successfully while simultaneously bankrupting the U.S.S.R.
What is ironic is that Wilson, the architect of the operation, was not only a liberal Democrat, but a loose cannon who didn’t let the fact that he was married get in he way of his boozing and womanizing. And among his many mistresses was socialite Joanne Herring (Julia Roberts), the sixth richest woman in his home state.
Their lustful liaison was proof of the age-old maxim that politics makes strange bedfellows, literally and figuratively, for she was a conservative, Christian fundamentalist who prevailed upon her well-connected boy-toy to get the CIA to intervene in the Middle East conflict in the name of freedom of religion. What neither of them anticipated, however, was that in the process of sending the Soviets to defeat they would be creating a new monster, a militarily-equipped radical Islam.
This is the arc of Charlie Wilson's War, a relatively lighthearted romp about a real-life James Bond. Fearless, suave and debonair, the film presents its misogynistic protagonist as very likable even though he hired his all-female staff members by breast size, because “You can teach ‘em to type, but you can’t teach ‘em to grow [T-words].”
Based on the best-selling biography of the same name by George Crile, the movie was faithfully adapted by Oscar-winner Mike Nichols (The Graduate), a director who has no problem delivering a warts-and-all depiction which has Charlie cavorting naked in a hot tub with coke-snorting strippers. For the message is clear, specifically, that the patriotic cad’s service to his country outweighs his countless sexual indiscretions.
Philip Seymour Hoffman turns in a typically-sound performance as second banana Gust Avrakotos, the CIA Agent through whom Wilson secretly funneled over a billion dollars to the Afghan freedom fighters. But make no mistake, this is a Tom Hanks vehicle, and the two-time Oscar-winner (for Philadelphiaand Forrest Gump) is nothing short of inspired in the title role as a gun-running, skirt-chasing bon vivant.
Unless somebody’s taking liberties with the truth here, history will one day confirm that all it took to bring an end to the Cold War was the valiant efforts of an otherwise unprincipled party animal who knew his way around Washington well-enough to be unburdened by red tape, bureaucrats or democracy. Charlie Wilson, a real American hero, belatedly revealed.
             
Rating: R for profanity, nudity, sexuality and drug use.
Running time: 97 minutes
Studio: Universal Pictures

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I Am Legend
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Will Smith as Last Man on Earth in Adaptation of Apocalyptic Sci-Fi Adventure

Written by Richard Matheson in 1954, I Am Legend was a harrowing tale of survival pitting the last human alive against the horde of bloodthirsty vampires who had taken control of Earth. The book’s hero, Robert Neville, relied on a combination of garlic, mirrors, stakes, sunlight and crosses to keep the cannibals at bay while he simultaneously tried to come up with a the scientific explanation for the plague which had turned everybody else into zombies.
The Last Man on Earth (1964), starring Vincent Price, was the first film adaptation of the apocalyptic best seller. That, in turn, was followed by The Omega Man (1971) with Charlton Heston and, more recently, by I Am Omega (2007), a straight-to-video rip-off released just last month.
Now, we have I Am Legend, a relatively-realistic, modern update of the original which reflects present-day sensibilities by having its apocalyptic scenario result from a man-made virus. The picture is a Will Smith vehicle in the purest sense, given that he spends more than half of the movie on screen alone (ala Tom Hanks in Cast Away), unless you count the omnipresent Samantha, his trusty, tagalong German Shepherd.
Thus, the production represents a true test of Smith’s star power, as its fortunes are fated to rise or fall to the extent that he convinces his audience to invest emotionally in his lonely protagonist’s desperate plight as he perambulates the eerie exoskeleton of a depopulated Manhattan. The point of departure is 2009, which is when one Dr. Alice Crippen (Emma Thompson) announces the discovery of a cure for cancer to the world, not knowing that the vaccine also causes rabies.
Fast-forward three years, and we find New York in chaos. The healthy few are in the midst of being quickly evacuated, while all the infected folks are morphing into ghouls and being left behind. And although Lieutenant Colonel Robert Neville (Smith) has been given a clean bill of health, he gallantly opts to stay in the city to work on an antidote.
You see, he’s a virologist, and has a fully-equipped, state-of-the-art lab in the basement of his brownstone bordering Washington Square Park. So, after he tearfully bids his wife (Salli Richardson) and daughter (Willow Smith) adieu, he proceeds to divide his time between scientific research and blowing away the occasional nocturnal creature he encounters after dark.
Not surprisingly, Will Smith comes across as quite the macho charmer in his familiar role as the hero having to save the planet. After all, he’s successfully played this sort of character plenty of times before, most notably in such CGI-driven spectaculars as Independence Day (1996), Men in Black (1997) and Men in Black II (2002). But who knows how a holiday season release of this summer-style blockbuster will be met?
I Am Legend is actually at its best early on, while Will is solo and captured starkly against the breathtaking backdrop of the vast, urban wasteland. Unfortunately, the second-rate special effects leave a lot to be desired, so the arrival of the cheesy mansters he has to wrestle with fails to measure up to the tension built in anticipation.
The movie has a couple of other annoying flaws, neither of which could be discussed without spoiling the fun. Suffice to say that the first involves the introduction of two new characters near the end, and the other revolves around the movie’s revised resolution which delivers a distinctly different message from that of the book.   
Nonetheless, it’s got a great performance by Will Smith and just enough edge-of-your-seat entertainment to remain recommended, even if the cinematic house of cards collapses during the third act.
 
Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of sci-fi action and mature themes.
Running time: 100 minutes
Studio: Warner Brothers

Will Is Legend
The I Am Legend Interview

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The Great Debaters
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Inspirational Bio-Bic Beset by Baffling Historical Inaccuracies

When a movie bills itself as “Inspired by a True Story,” to what
extent should it be allowed to take liberties with the truth to spin a heartwarming tale which tugs on the heartstrings? That is the question which begs to be answered in the course of appraising The Great Debaters, an inspirational bio-pic about a professor who, in 1935, allegedly forged the fledgling debate team at a tiny black college into a nationally-ranked powerhouse that took on Harvard University in a big showdown aired on radio live all across the country.
The film’s most glaring, factualfaux pas is that while Wiley College
did, in fact, participate in the championships finals that year, its opponent was not Harvard at all, but USC. This fabrication naturally makes one wonder about other aspects of this recreation. Was the original contest really broadcast live on radio? (Unlikely) Was it even the first time, as implied, that a black college competed against a white school in the debate tournament? (No) Etcetera… etcetera… Furthermore, the picture propagated plenty of other tall tales. For instance, there’s a scene where Professor Tolson (Denzel Washington) attempts instill some self respect in his pupils by quoting from Willie Lynch’s 1712 speech supposedly delivered to
fellow slave owners about how to mold and control the minds of their slaves. Well, the problem is that the infamous lecture never took place, and has long been dismissed by academics and experts, some African-American, as an urban legend which first surfaced circa 1993. There isn’t any reference to the speech in any literature prior to then. So, how could a professor have lectured about it way back when? Since I’ve criticized references made to Willie Lynch by other flicks, it would be hypocritical for me to give The Great Debaters a pass just because it’s such a well-meaning message
movie.
There are considerable additional conceptual obstacles in the way of
enjoying this consciousness-raising costume drama. For instance, whenever the Wiley team debates, it invariably is conveniently assigned to argue the politically-correct side of the issue, whether that be about welfare, lynching, integration, child labor, civil disobedience or elsewhat. Isn’t the mark of a skilled debater the ability to make a convincing case for either side, especially unpopular causes you don’t believe in? All of the above fibs and fabrications aside, there is still much to recommend here. Denzel certainly delivers as the film’s plucky protagonist, as does Forest Whitaker in his co-star capacity as his less-confrontational colleague, James Farmer, Sr. Gina Rivera and Kimberly Elise capably play their wives, respectively, in support roles which aren’t all that demanding. The cast is rounded out by the quartet of gifted young actors who comprise the Wiley debate team. Only one of these four characters, lovesick 14 year-old James Farmer, Jr. (Denzel Whitaker), is based on a real person. The precocious Farmer would later found the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), and go on to become a leader
of the Civil Rights Movement. So, the other three debaters, feisty
Samantha Booke (Jurnee Smollett), her womanizing boyfriend Henry Lowe (Nate Parker), and hefty Hamilton Burgess (Jermaine Williams) are fictional. This makes the closing credits a tad misleading, since it relates Tolson’s and Farmers’ subsequent actual exploits along with alleged later achievements of the others, even though they never existed.
One can only conclude that this movie was designed for youngsters,
not adults. If that’s the case, do we want impressionable young minds understanding of history to be misshaped in this fashion? Well- Intentioned and well-executed, and recommended with reservations only because there’s still something terribly troubling even about a feelgood flick packed with so many misrepresentations. Does the truth matter, or is reality retroactively up for grabs? Let the debating begin.

Rated: PG-13 for profanity, ethnic slurs, mature themes, brief sexuality, violence and disturbing images.
Running time: 123 minutes
Studio: MGM

There’s No Debate, Kimberly’s Great 
The Great Debaters interview with Kam Williams

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Dirty Laundry
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Prodigal Son Returns to Roots in Out of the Closet Comedy

Sheldon (Rockmond Dunbar), a successful staff writer for a magazine in Manhattan, hasn’t been home to Georgia in over a decade, and not just because of the demands of his busy career. Seems that he’s been living a lie and hasn’t figured out how to break the news to family and friends back in his tight-knit Black community that he’s a homosexual.
To protect his secret, he’s created an alter ego, and goes by the name of Patrick in New York City, where he’s secretly shacking up with a flamboyant white guy named Ryan (Joey Costello). But their gay bliss is suddenly shattered when a little angel named Gabriel (Aaron Grady Shaw) unexpectedly arrives on their doorstep.
Turns out that Gabriel is Sheldon’s 10 year-old son, the result of a liaison from when he was still on the down-low. Now, the emotionally-needy kid has been sent to find his father by his paternal grandmother, Evelyn (Loretta Devine). Ill-equipped either to explain Gabriel’s appearance or to handle the responsibility of raising a child, Sheldon heads to Georgia, his young offspring in tow.
So unfolds Dirty Laundry, an out of the closet comedy written and directed by Maurice Jamal (The Skip Trip), who is perhaps best known for his numerous appearances on Dave Chappelle’s self-cancelled series on Comedy Central. The bulk of the movie takes place in and around matriarch Evelyn’s house, where we meet an array of African-American characters, familiar cookie-cutter stereotypes ranging from the Greek chorus of Bible-thumping church ladies to the shameless narcissist (Jenifer Lewis) to the clueless Neanderthal (Jamal) to the sassy trash-talker (Sommore).
Because the film’s opening act is littered with the generally jive behavior of an assortment of two-dimensional stick figures, it’s a little hard swallow the notion that Sheldon would be so readily embraced when the plot thickens upon the arrival of his lifemate. Even though homophobia is undoubtedly much more of a hurdle in the ‘hood as opposed to a light-hearted Hollywood adventure, the motley ensemble’s supportive response to Sheldon’s revealing his sexual preference proves to be a surprisingly sweet way to bring down the curtain on this well-meaning message movie.

Rating: PG-13 for profanity, sexuality, homophobic slurs and mature themes.
Running time: 107 minutes
Studio: CodeBlack Entertainment

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Atonement
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Ambitious Adaptation of Romance Novel Ultimately Unsatisfying

How many times have you heard yourself say that the book was better? Well, be prepared to add this historical drama to that long list of disappointing screen adaptations. Based on Ian McEwan’s critically-acclaimed romance novel of the same name, Atonement is an overly-ambitious adaptation which takes license with conventional, linear storytelling by periodically repeating scenes from slightly different perspectives.
This implausible flight of fancy was directed by Joe Wright (Pride & Prejudice) who earns higher marks here for crafting a vibrant and visually-stimulating spectacle than for his picture’s ultimately unsatisfying underlying plotline. Stripped of its cinematic pretensions and period costumes, the film is essentially a very eventful tale of unrequited love. It all revolves around an improbable, incestuous love triangle which tears two sisters apart, ruins a promising young man’s future, and leaves the vengeful, odd-girl out wracked with guilt for the rest of her days. 
Set on the sprawling country estate of the Tallis family, this generation-spanning saga opens in England in 1935. There, we find our protagonist, 13 year-old Briony (Saoirse Ronan) staging her own plays with the help of her relatives. She also devotes considerable time to spying on her big sister Cecilia’s (Keira Knightley) flirtations with their housekeeper’s handsome son, Robbie (James McAvoy).
Cecilia and Robbie, both students at Cambridge, have recently returned home for summer vacation. Although too young to turn his head, the sexually-awakening Briony has a crush on Robbie, too. But because he only has eyes for her sibling, the frustrated voyeur begins to misread the macho object of her affection as a carnal, out of control pervert.
This tendency turns tragic the night she comes upon her Cousin Lola (Juno Temple) being raped by a stranger on the grounds outside the mansion. Based on Briony’s eyewitness testimony, however, Robbie is unfairly convicted of the crime and is carted off to prison.
Fast forward a few years. World War II has broken out. Ex-con Robbie has enlisted in the British Army and is participating in the evacuation of Dunkirk. Cecilia and Briony are both nurses back in London, though they no longer speak to each other. The former still pines for Robbie while the latter is now saddled with overwhelming regret about having fingered an innocent man.
But in lieu of righting the wrong, Briony, an aspiring writer, takes to chronicling the course of Cecilia and Robbie’s undying love relationship in a novel called Atonement, a task which takes sixty years to complete. On her death bed, Briony (as portrayed by Vanessa Redgrave) pulls a rabbit out of her hat which conveniently fills in all the pieces of the puzzle. However, that unfair turn of events renders almost meaningless most of what you’ve just emotionally invested a couple of hours.  
What’s it all about, Briony?

Rating: R for profanity, sexuality and disturbing war images.
Running time: 116 minutes
Studio: Focus Features

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