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Dan Carlson
Los Angeles, California

I'm a twentysomething white male with ambitions to be a professional film critic and generally spend my days getting paid to watch movies and write about it. A compulsive reader and stubborn cineaste, I take an often contrary stance to my more fundamentalist peers and upbringing by celebrating the pursuit of the good, and the Good, in life, love, art and film. If you watched enough episodes of certain TV shows — for starters, "The Hungry and the Hunted," "The Cut Man Cometh," "The Body," "The Zeppo," "Waiting in the Wings," "Out of Gas," "April Is the Cruelest Month," "20 Hours in America," "Colonial Day," "An Echolls Family Christmas," "Look Who's Stalking," "The Garage Door," "Charlie Gets Crippled," "Wind Sprints," and "Corner Boys" — you would understand me completely, and you'd also realize that much of my worldview and philosophical insights are heavily influenced by fictional works/programs, and many of the good things I've said in my life are just a regurgitation of someone else's imaginings, or at any rate a heartfelt attempt to interpret them. I guess I was made to be a film critic.

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« Review: Juno |Main| Clear Eyes, Collateral Damage: An Online Transcript »

December 10, 2007

Review: Atonement

By Dan Carlson

Is it really necessary to bark out little immature laughs whenever you see an expletive in print in a movie? Or to titter at something too emotionally complex for you to understand? Really? I expected better, ArcLight crowd. Granted, you weren't as uncouth as those asshats down at the Landmark, but still. I expected better.

Anyway, the movie was amazing.

Click here for the review.

Also: Aaron Mesh over at the Willamette Week disagrees with my take on Atonement. But his review is pretty damn great. It really is. I'm not being at all facetious, either. (And I realize that writing that out only makes me sound like I really am being facetious, but I can't seem to figure out how to break the vicious cycle.) Anyway, we differ on Joe Wright's skill level, but Mesh wrote a pretty wonderful review.

Comments: 2

sarah

Will Pajiba be doing a review of Sweeney Todd?

Dec 10, 2007 10:14 AM

Constance

"It was Robbie! In the library! With a penis!"

Ha! I'm going to see this tonight with both of these great reviews floating around my head. Full comment report to follow...;)

Dec 12, 2007 8:18 AM

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