Atonement 🎥 2007 Movie Info

Plot Summary

In 1935 England, 13-year-old Briony Tallis, the youngest daughter of the wealthy Tallis family, spies on her older sister, Cecilia, and the housekeeper’s son, Robbie Turner, from a window. During Cecilia’s and Robbie’s argument by the garden fountain, Robbie accidentally breaks a vase and yells at Cecilia to not move to not cut her feet. Still angered, Cecilia removes her dress, climbing into the fountain to retrieve one of the ceramic pieces. Briony misinterprets the relationship between them. Robbie drafts Cecilia a note in apology. In one draft, he openly reveals his attraction to her graphically. He unintentionally places it in an envelope which he has Briony deliver to Cecilia.

She reads it before handing it to her sister. Later, Briony describes the note to her 15-year-old cousin Lola, who calls Robbie a “sex maniac”. Paul Marshall, a visiting friend of Briony and Cecilia’s older brother Leon, introduces himself to the visiting cousins and appears attracted to Lola. Before dinner, Robbie and Cecilia are alone in the library, so he apologises for the obscene letter, but she confesses her love for him. They make love against the wall there as Briony walks in, who mistakenly thinks her sister is being raped. During dinner, Lola’s twin brothers go missing, so the household organises search parties.

While seeking the boys, Briony comes across Lola being raped by a man who flees. Despite not seeing him clearly, Briony insists it was Robbie; a confused Lola who did not see his face does not dissent. Later, Robbie, who has found the twins unharmed, brings them to the house. He is arrested for the rape despite Cecilia’s pleas of his innocence. Lola and Briony’s testimony, along with her turning over the explicit letter, convinces everyone but Cecilia of his guilt. Four years later, during the Second World War, Robbie is drafted from prison.

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