Atonement Review: One Of The Best War Movies In Recent Memory [TIFF]

A few great movies have generated a ton of buzz at TIFF 2026, and Reed Van Dyk's Atonement deserves to be mentioned right alongside them.

Published Sep 18, 2026, 9:46 AM EDT

Josh is a film critic and journalist with over nine years of experience in the entertainment industry. Entering the field at just 17 years old, Josh went on to make his own website, The HoloFiles, and social media brand Star Wars Holocron, the most followed Star Wars fan account on Twitter/X.

A member of both the Chicago Indie Critics and the Hollywood Critics Alliance, Josh has covered major industry events including Star Wars Celebration and, most recently, CinemaCon for ScreenRant. His work has appeared in outlets such as Game Rant and Comic Book Resources (CBR), and he has been featured in publications including the BBC and The New York Times.

War films are some of the most frequently made in the entire industry. On the one hand, that’s a good thing, as audiences are exposed to various points of view on a given conflict. On the other hand, they have the potential to get quite repetitive if too many similar films are made in a short span of time. That’s arguably what happened in the late 2000s and early 2010s, when countless war-in-the-Middle-East movies were made. Some, like Zero Dark Thirty, stood out, while others felt like just a bloody depiction of war without providing a reason for showing such brutal violence and death.

There have been fewer Middle Eastern-set war films in recent years, likely a response to audience fatigue. The new film Atonement, which screened at the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival, returns to this milieu to show audiences something very different. Directed by Reed Van Dyk in his feature debut, Atonement follows three individuals across several years, all of whom were involved in the same deadly incident in Iraq. Boyd Holbrook stars as Lou D’Alessandro, and is joined by Kenneth Branagh as Michael Reid and Hiam Abbass as Mariam Khachaturian. After having mistakenly killed two of Miriam’s children in 2003, Lou reaches out to the family years later to make amends, with the help of Michael, a journalist for The New Yorker.

Atonement Is More Than Just A War Movie

Atonement begins with a roughly 20-minute sequence showing the initial tragedy that brings everyone together. In these scenes, there’s some action, with American soldiers firing at their enemies, using machine guns and even rocket launchers to win the battle. The film’s opening feels a little like something you’ve seen before in these early moments, but it’s for good reason, as the beginning sets the stage for what’s to come.

Once the events of 2003 end, and the film flashes forward ten years later, Atonement becomes almost the complete opposite of a typical war movie. There are no guns and no violence; even raised voices are hard to find. In their place are quiet, deeply meaningful conversations about guilt, shame, grief, and moving on.

Holbrook takes all of that in his stride, playing his character with an equal amount of grace and pain.

Boyd Holbrook has always been a reliable actor, often appearing in memorable supporting roles in both film and television. He’s typically able to show off his cool demeanor and swagger in those roles, but it’s rare that he's given a chance to play a character with so much depth as he is here. When the film cuts from 2003 to 2013, Lou is wracked with PTSD, working odd jobs to make ends meet, struggling to maintain a relationship with his girlfriend, and taking drugs to numb the pain. Not only that, but he’s having nightmares about the day in Iraq when he mistakenly fired on civilians, leaving him unable to sleep.

These are all incredibly heavy features to include in a character, which only increases the pressure on Holbrook. Adding to that pressure is also the weight of representing this real-life story, and Iraq war veterans more broadly, who likely relate to at least some of what the character is saying. Holbrook takes all of that in his stride, playing his character with an equal amount of grace and pain.

Hundreds of movies have premiered at TIFF this year. There’s a lot of buzz around a few titles, such as I Play Rocky and The Debut – Atonement deserves to be mentioned right alongside them. With a powerful script that is as emotional as it is compelling, Reed Van Dyk’s feature debut is incredibly impressive, and proves that this is just the start of the career for one of the industry’s most promising filmmakers.

Atonement screened at the 2026 Toronto International Film Festival. The film releases in US theaters on October 2.