Cloud Atlas (2012) review

To put it bluntly, Cloud Atlas will go down as one of the most ambitious movies ever made. A near three-hour epic spanning across centuries with the members of its cast portraying multiple characters through six separate storylines across time. Yes, the latest film from the Wachowskis and Tom Twyker is one to be admired for this trio's efforts of adapting a novel that many deemed unfilmable and making it work on the big screen. This is a film that I cannot explain completely just through words. But one thing that is certain is that this is not a perfect film. On one hand, it's compelling, well-acted, and it stays consistent in the right areas when it needs to be. However, the way it juggles these multiple storylines is rather problematic and it's not entirely clear how all of these storylines connect to each other in the first place.

Cloud Atlas is not a single story, but a group of stories that takes us from the 19^th century to a post-apocalyptic future. We follow a notary (Jim Sturgess) as he travels across the sea whilst battling an illness, a musician (Ben Whishaw) as he writes music for an old composer, a journalist (Halle Berry) as she investigates into a unsafe power plant, a publisher (Jim Broadbent) as he tries to escape from a mental hospital in which he is confined in, a fabricant (Doona Bae) as she escapes to inspire a rebellion in a dystopian future, and a tribesman (Tom Hanks) in the post-apocalyptic future. Throughout the film, we learn how the actions of one character impacts another in the past and future and how a killer can be a hero in another life, and vice versa.

First off, you have to admire this film's scope and ambition. There really hasn't been a film like this before that has tried to juggle all of these storylines into one single film and for the most part, it works very well here. The narrative never falls apart at any point, even when the film starts to move rapidly through all of these storylines. However, there's one problem that emerges from this. It seems like some of these six stories felt more important than others. The two segments set in the future seem to get the most screen-time out of all of the six storylines, but the segments about the musician and the notary seem unimportant as the film spends more time in other eras than these two. The segment with the journalist almost falls to that level, but it does get really thrilling near the end. Finally, the segment about the publisher has the best humor in the entire film. So basically, the two future segments and the one with the publisher are the standout parts of the film.

Really when you get down to it, I actually didn't see how all of these stories were supposed to be connected. This might be because I never read the book this was based on, but to me the only real ways these stories were connected were for two reasons. First of all, excluding the first story, the main character of each proceeding storyline learns of the previous' main character's adventure through various means, whether it is a diary or a 'dramatic reenactment'. Aside from that, we of course have the fact that these actors portrayed multiple characters across time periods. Part of me feels like that wasn't necessary, but it is pretty cool to see each actor in different roles and see how they adapt to each character they play. Some of these characters even have them doing something that is against what they are used to, as some of these characters have them change race and even gender on some occasions.

That does not mean that this is a bad movie, because it is far from it. Even though it's almost three-hours long (apparently it's much longer overseas), it's never really dull and it's just plain intriguing to watch. Even if some storylines are focused on more than others, the tone is very consistent and it never really makes any jarring shifts, except for one instance where we transition from a light-hearted chase scene to a thriller. The acting is also very solid, and there is not a single bad performance from this cast. The standout would probably have to be Tom Hanks (one of the few who is literally in every era), but we also have strong performances from Halle Berry, Hugo Weaving (even though pretty much all of his characters are bad guys (although he was awesome as this demon spirit-like character in the post-apocalyptic future)), Jim Sturgess, Jim Broadbent, Ben Whishaw, Hugh Grant, and Susan Sarandon.

Really, I just don't know what to say about this film. On one hand, I admire this film's ambition, its scope, and the terrific cast. But this is not exactly a perfect film either. I couldn't really see how all of these stories were supposed to be connected aside from the fact that each actor was playing different characters through time. On top of that, I feel that more was needed for some of the other segments not set in the future, but then again that would probably detract from the original source material. To its credit, the film never got dull and even though I never read the book this was based on, it wasn't really that confusing. However, I would recommend you at least read up on this book before seeing the film because otherwise you'll probably be confused at what's going on. 

Rating: 3/5