Soundtracks Reviews
Soundtrack Review: Atonement
By Jeff Swindoll
Dec 19, 2007, 16:18 GMT

The Golden Globe nominees have been announced and one of the surprises was that the recently opened British drama atonement scored seven nominations.  One of the nominations was for musical score, but that really shouldn’t come as any surprise to those that have heard the soundtrack. 

Composer Dario Marianelli has one Academy Award nomination under his belt and the Golden Globe attention may well guarantee that he gets consideration for Atonement.  However such attention is deserving since the soundtrack is very good. 

Atonement tells of an older woman looking back to her past when she accused a boy of a crime that now she thinks that he didn’t commit.  She destroyed his life and now in her old age seeks to right her wrongs by telling the tale. 

The soundtrack is a delight, but also has moments of melancholy as you can imagine would be felt if you had committed such an accusation and now feel the worse for it.  Pianist Jean-Yves Thiabaudet performs several solos on the album and a typewriter is used very effectively as a musical instrument in several of the tracks. 

It may have melancholy but it still has some sweeping orchestrations and is well deserving of the attention that the Golden Globes have shined upon it.  Here’s looking forward that the Academy might also shine on it as well.