Angus goes to the Movies

Mrs. Angus and I weekended in Dallas. Caught a Mavs game and saw a few movies. Against my inclination, but on the strength of its Golden Globe for best picture, one of them was "Atonement".

Holy Crap people. What a stinker! I was going all mystery science theatre on it, embarrassing Mrs. Angus. Let me be specific. The plot makes no sense, driven as it is by a string of impossibly unlikely coincidences and everything is melodramatically signaled well in advance of it's actual occurrence. Apparently torn between a happy or sad ending the filmmakers delivered both!! The movie is best viewed as a Monty Python-esque send up of British people. Everyone is a cliche. The foppish rich lads, the genius and perfect servant's son, the evil little girl, the hospital matron, the cockney soldier.

The half hearted attempts to show the horrors of war are basically laugh out loud funny for their surrealistic pomposity. No one seems real and there is nothing that makes you care or emotionally invest in any outcome, whether it be happy or sad.