How are women represented in the first 20 minutes of Atonement?

By 'women' in the first 20 minutes I'm going to use Keira Knightley's character as the main example. The girl writing the play doesn't count as she's not a woman.


In the first scene we see KK strip to her (modest) undergarments and climb into a pond. The implication from the first point of view is that there's something sinister as a young man is with her and he appears to leer at her when she comes out. The roles are then reversed later on and we see that the young man is innocent and that KK is angry at him.

In the second scene we see that Keira Knightley is sunbathing while engaging in pleasant banter with two aristocrats. The idea that she's conforming to being a genteel proper lady is shown. Doing ladylike things like sunbathing. The camerawork also helps to sexually objectify her by bringing attention to her body.

From the story KK is shown to be independent with a strong personality. She isn't shown to be simple either. So this reverses the stereotype that rich ladies of the time were stupid.

It's useful to keep in mind the fact that her character doesn't represent all the women, it represents a group of women at the time.