I recently read the novel so was keen to see the movie version of Atonement with Rosalie.

The early reviews were not overly flattering, so I wasn’t hoping for an amazing movie. I was pleasantly surprised by how beautiful it was. Very much like the book, it was delicate, understated and old world in style.

Atonement was also very faithful to the book, with only one major deviation from the novel – the ending of all things! I would have much preferred if the movie had remained completely faithful to the book, but I think the change was made to enable Briony to voice her thoughts and hopes for atonement. In the book she internalises her thoughts on this, and without a narrator in the movie, it would have been much harder to get the character development and message across.

What I enjoyed most about the film was the cinematography and small details like musical themes and whimsical moments of filming, capturing tiny moments that summed up the characters so perfectly and spoke louder than dialogue. I also thought the editing was fabulous, as well as storytelling methods like showing the same moment through different characters points of view. it could have been disjointed, but it as seamless.

Since I read the book first, I don’t know how much people who haven’t read it would enjoy the movie, but I loved it.

I loved the first National Treasure movie – rollicking good fun, I think I called it at the time. Clean fun with a happy ending. My perfect movie.

When the sequel opened this week, Alec and I were keen to go. We’ve seen so many movies lately with sad endings, I just needed something happy!

National Treasure lived up to its promises – action, flippant, superficial characters, codes needing to be broken, and a happy ending. Perfect!

I enjoyed the entire movie. Yes, it’s not the best movie ever. In fact, it’s got some pretty bad things about it – bad writing and characterisation, clues that require enormous leaps of assumption to get the answer, which of course Nicholas Cage’s character gets off the top of his head, and Nicholas Cage himself – he looks like he’s lost quite a lot of weight and has had some kind of plastic surgery or air brushing on his neck. Still, all of this doesn’t matter. I really really enjoyed the movie and will be getting it on DVD to watch again on rainy sad days.

The premise of the movie – I really should get to that. Nicholas Cage’s character (Ben Gates) is presented with evidence that suggests his great-great-grandfather was a conspirator in the Lincoln assassination. In order to clear his ancestor’s name, he has to find the treasure his great–great-grandfather was helping to conceal. To do this, Gates has to break into all kinds of famous places like Buckingham Palace, the White House and kidnap the President to get information out of the legendary Presidents’ Book of Secrets, which supposedly contains all of the secrets of the United States, like the truth behind the JFK assassination. Far fetched – yes, Did I care? No.

The movie borrowed heavily from several other movies that I love, like The Goonies, Raiders Of The Lost Ark and The Da Vinci Code. At least it did it well! Fine holiday fun.