An inside look at 'Atonement'

"Atonement" cinematographer Seamus McGarvey on shooting the Dunkirk beach scene.

THE first part of "Atonement" is set in 1935 on the hottest day of the summer. I shot with Dior stockings on the lens to give the film a balmy, lustrous glow. When it came to photographing Dunkirk, director Joe Wright and I wanted an austere, ascetic feel.

We wanted a contrast for the scenes in which Robbie and two fellow soldiers make their way toward Dunkirk, where the British forces are gathering after failing to quell the German push into France.

With only two days to shoot, Joe and I decided to film the scene in one complex 5 1/2 -minute Steadicam shot. We wanted to create a shot that would ebb between the grand vista and epic drama of the Dunkirk evacuation and the subjective inner head space of Robbie.

We attempted to let the camera become, by turns, witness and protagonist, aware that the eventual fusion of sound and picture would evoke an atmospheric dreamscape grounded in a very vivid reality.

The art department built a detailed scale model of the beach, which allowed us to work out what we'd see at each point, how best to use our action vehicles, where to place fires and where we could maximize the impact of our 1,000 extras.

There was a strange phenomenon: Cloud diffusion appeared in the atmosphere, creating a little rainbow band on the edge of the sun. It was a beautiful, delicate color and the light was exquisite.