Review: Cloud Atlas (Cinema)

With a best selling Booker shortlisted novel providing the foundation, an A-list cast, a directing and screenwriting team comprising cinema's most bankable, aligned with a $100 million budget, it was probably too much to ask that Cloud Atlas would live up to its promise.

The book of the same name is made up of six layered stories that chart one soul's many experiences through several lifetimes, starting in the 1800s through to the 24th century. Throughout the sometimes brilliant and constantly entertaining stories we are treated to underlying themes that spotlight the travails of humanity.

In adapting this for the big screen team Wachowski and Tykwer made two brave decisions. The first was to inter-cut the stories based on pacing and not tell them in turn, which works very well, adding a powerful layer to an already powerful narrative. The second, in shoehorning the same core actors into wildly different roles, often in the process covering them in heavy make-up and latex prosthetics, they badly detract from the validity and message at key moments. This happens most tragically at the film's denouement as we cut between the comedic sight of Hugo Weaving dressed as a Mrs Doubtfire alike nurse busy chasing escapee pensioners, to the heart wrenching conclusion of Sonmi's future prophetic journey in Neo-Soul.

The prosthetics and the obvious struggle of the actors to convey emotions and expression badly undermines our immersion and explains why some of the movie execs got cold feet in funding marketing, which resulted in Cloud Atlas bombing in the US and its release being staggered world-wide.

Of the cast Jim Broadbent is great quality although his story as Timothy Cavendish is the weakest of both the book and movie, also sadly the one most bogged down with latex. Jim Sturgess does his best work as a future Korean revolutionary, Tom Hanks is always great value for money, and Halle Berry is just good. The show stealer for me was the excellently cast Ben Wishaw who's performance reverberated through the entire story, nicely complementing Sonmi's tale, also acted with the same heartfelt strength and resonance by Doona Bae. It is these two tales that stand out for me in the movie.

There is plenty to see and be thrilled by in Cloud Atlas, most notably for a film helmed in two of three parts by the Wachowski (Matrix trilogy) siblings, the future Neo-Soul of Sonmi's story is often eye popping edge of the seat stuff. There are perhaps a few over simplifications across the board in conversion from book to screen and certainly one too many trite conclusions not found on the page. The latex flaw I have already discussed at length. Despite all this Cloud Atlas is an experience you should attempt at least in one of its two forms. The stories themselves are powerful and entertaining and the themes they convey are worthy of your deliberations.

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