Cloud Atlas
2012
***
Director: Lana Wachowski, Lilly Wachowski, Tom Tykwer
Cast: Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Jim Broadbent, Hugo Weaving, Jim Sturgess, Doona Bae, Ben Whishaw, James D'Arcy, Keith David, Susan Sarandon, Hugh Grant
It took three directors to adapt David Mitchell’s unfilmable 2004 novel. This hugely ambitious epic tells six thinly connected stories that range from the mid-1800s to the distant post-apocalyptic future. Each strand follows individuals who choose to resist injustice. Tykwer and the Wachowskis each filmed three of the sections, but they blend beautifully together through inventive transitions. The resulting film is nearly three hours long, consistently mystifying, and often gripping. Whether the six parts make a cohesive and poignant whole is a different question. Characters from one story reincarnate in another, but it feels like a mistake to have a small cast play multiple roles. I would prefer to be immersed in the dramatic events rather than chuckle every time I recognise a familiar face behind a silly wig, fake nose, or obvious movie makeup.
