clarity of passion

do yourselves a favor and watch atonement as soon as you can. this movie is a work of art, each frame is like a painting. of course i do not have to add another superlative to the on-going ian mcewan worship happening all over the literary world -- the story is original and it will not disappoint you.

i love keira knightley in this film, she plays a character whose properly disturbed and nonchalant at the same time. james mcavoy is superb. no matter how his character is suppose to mature as the story progresses, he retains enough boyish innocence to keep our sympathy all along.

towards the end, robbie tells cecilia that he longs to return to her with the "clarity of passion" that they had once shared in the past. this strikes me as particularly fascinating since we often speak of "passion" as akin to a frenzied state of mindlessness. interestingly enough, the tagalog word for lust (which is essentially passion in the physical sense), is libog -- visayan for confusion. in the story, this passion was far from madness: it was single-minded, focused, clear.

even war and deception became peripheral.