At the crossroads moment of Joe Wright’s “Atonement,” Keira Knightley whispers “come back to me” to her lover (James McAvoy) as he slips away from her arms, destined for war – his sentence for a crime he didn’t commit.

One can’t help but deliver a similar plea to the film, as it produces the visual splendor of an epic love story but is undone by a lack of emotional intensity in its middle passages, before being revived by an inspired conclusion.

This is not to say you should avoid the film, but perhaps minimize the gargantuan expectations attached to it in this Oscar season. Director Joe Wright should be commended for getting us (males, that is) to watch characters declare their love in melodramatic letters, complete with waves crashing in the background, and still leave the theater with our testicles intact.

He once again displays the technical mastery he unveiled in 2005′s “Pride and Prejudice” with a series of jaw-dropping long shots that accentuate the decadence of the British aristocratic lifestyle. Using a hyper-focus on sound, he intensifies an impending doom with each creak in the floor, flicker of a lighter and thumping of a typewriter.

Yet, particularly in a romance, all is futile without audience investment in the perilous lovers – Cecilia (Knightley), a child of luxury, and Robbie (McAvoy), the son of the family’s housekeeper.

But this is not their story to tell. Rather, our raconteur is Briony (Saoirse Ronan), a 13-year-old girl so stiff she appears to be a hybrid of a teenager and an ostrich. She causes the split between the two when she naively identifies Robbie as a sexual deviant after a house guest is attacked.

From there, the film begins to disintegrate. It may be attributed to the brevity of time between Cecilia and Robbie, but their despair comes off as nothing more than lip service and appears lost in translation from Ian McEwan’s prodigious novel.

It is when the film evolves from its half-assed examination of war (despite a tracking shot that would make Robert Altman drool from his grave) to a focus on Briony’s atonement that the lavish story finds its scant emotional chord and own form of redemption.

There is a saying in Hollywood that all you need is an exhilarating opening and a poignant finale to produce a hit.

I would beg to differ, and “Atonement” is Exhibit A.