Reed Van Dyk is talking about the current echoes of his latest film, Atonement.
The film screened at TIFF 2026.
Dyk's latest is an Iraqi war drama.
Atonement, the feature directorial debut from Oscar-nominated filmmaker Reed Van Dyk, made its North American premiere at Toronto International Film Festival after receiving acclaim at the Cannes Directors’ Fortnight. Boyd Holbrook, Hiam Abbass, and Kenneth Branagh lead the drama.
Inspired by Dexter Filkins’ 2012 New Yorker article of the same name, Atonement opens in the early days of the Iraq War. After U.S. military action drives the Khachaturian family from their Baghdad home, three generations seek refuge with relatives. Another nearby bombing convinces them to cross the war-torn city and return home, but they become ensnared in a firefight between American Marines and insurgents.
Reed Van Dyk On Atonement's Current Resonances
“One of the things I thought making (Atonement) was that you feel the ripple effect from one small incident, on one day, into all of these lives, as bombs fall and they’re caught up in a war. So many years later, I felt these incidents are just multiplying over and over and over again, in every new conflict,” Van Dyk shared with audiences during a post-North American premiere Q&A on Tuesday night.
“That’s left me heavy-hearted. And while the world has changed since I started writing (Atonement), history repeats. And as we were editing, I was reading headlines that brought new context to the movie,” the director added. Gheed, Majd Eid, Gratiela Brancusi, Tahseen Dahis, Jake Weary, Amanda Warren, and Khris Davis round out the cast. Trevor White, Tim White, David M. Wulf, Van Dyk, and Steven Demmler produced, with Kino Lorber distributing.
For Holbrook, as he essayed a damaged Iraqi war veteran, he told the Toronto fest audience, “I have so much respect for the men and women who serve our country, and being caught up in the fog of war, and coming back home and navigating that on your own, and hitting rock bottom and being shattered from the inside — I just found such a fresh perspective with what this film gave.”
The Toronto Film Festival is on till Sept. 20.
