Cloud Atlas

Cloud Atlas

So, I've tried to write this review for a few days now and have been avoiding it like the plague for the symple reason that it is very difficult to compress this much information into one post that people will want to read and that I will want to write but here goes.

So the movie is about a group of souls that are tied together by the red strings of fate and their interactions in each of their lifetimes. The trailers for this movie do a decent job of showing the main times they explore. (Anywhere from the 1700s to the 70's on up to uber high tech future times and even further than that.) All in all you get 7 (maybe 8?) separate stories to enjoy. The film is almost 3 hours long but because of the way the movie flashes forward and back between time it doesn't seem like all that long. I would akin this very close to The Fountain but with more humor and action. But while there is good humor and some cool action scenes there is a lot of darkness.

I don't know if many have heard his name before but a large part of this movie was influenced by co-director Tom Tykwer (Run Lola Run, The International, Perfume: The Story of a Murderer). *Personal Film Geek Note: If you like dark, atmospheric, creepy but not scary movies you should check out Perfume. It will level you up in awesome points!* You can really see the dark tones he puts into the movies that the Wachowski's just don't do as well.

Perfume was good  'n creepy. Right here he's trying to harness the smell of beauty.

 Overall the movie was rather charming in it's own right. Being about reincarnation the movie has the unique opportunity to let these actors play very different kinds of roles throughout the feature. My favorite part about watching this movie was trying to spot how everyone turned up in each lifetime. The makeup department for this movie was amazing. They age actors in some lives and even change their gender and skin color. I think Hally Berry had the most diversity at one point playing an old white guy and another time a white lady. Wait scratch that- I almost forgot about Hugo Weaving who while he is all over this film in many different forms can always be spotted rather easily because he is the tallest person around.

Some of the different faces of Hugo Weaving

 I overheard one hipster kid saying the film was 'contrived' when I was leaving which I don't think is fair. Sure the film ties itself together with an idea that is illustrated multiple times throughout the movie and is made to seems a great revelation to the film but is already common knowledge to most people who enjoy the use of their brain. But I almost feel like it is a requirement for films like these (The Fountain, Tree of Life maybe even 21 Grams) and without that convention the film may seem incomplete.


I give this movie a 7 out of 10
2 points Awesome make up
2 points An engaging story
1 point Great visuals
1 point Hugo weaving as an evil nurse
1 point Tom Hanks going black and not being able to go bac