Cloud AtlasWhen you think of a symphony, do you think of the individual notes...or do you think of the harmony, the collective force of the music which makes a composition, a representation of an emotion or feeling, a state of being, more than the sum of its parts? Cloud Atlas is a collection of stories, intercut and interwoven across time and space, stories about familiar characters, cast with actors in similar roles across that gulf. Some stories are about tragedy, some are comedy, and others deal with settings as alien to us as our world would be to those who came before; how like society in totum.
|
|
Talking about the greater themes of Cloud Atlas is a bit like talking about the greater themes of humanity, themes like freedom and culture, of race and religion, of love and loss, just as our history and the stories of our predecessors. Chronologically speaking, the focal stories of the film begin in the Nineteenth Century, with Adam Ewing (Jim Sturgess), a lawyer who travels to a plantation operated by slaves in the Pacific at the behest of his employer, but becomes sick, and is tended by both a curious doctor and also a stowaway slave. Ewing's story fuels the inspiration of a relatively unknown composer some years later; Robert Frobisher (Ben Whishaw) insinuates himself in the employ of a prickly mentor, and goes on to compose the "Cloud Atlas Sextet" symphony. Year later, while researching the hidden secrets of a nuclear power plant, reporter Luisa Rey (Halle Berry) discovers letters addressed to Rufus Sixsmith (James D'Arcy), Frobisher's lover, and this puts her on to tracking down Frobisher's symphony, something which stirs up subconscious memories of hers she didn't know she had. Timothy Cavendish (Jim Broadbent), a publisher on the run from a group of gangsters trying to extort money from him, ends up reading the account of Luisa Rey's expose of the events surrounding the nuclear plant, prior to being unwittingly committed to an institution. In the future, fabricant Sonmi-451 (Doona Bae) witnesses a scene from a film adaptation of Cavendish's account of his own adventure, an act which is forbidden as she is regarded as property, and not a person. And after The Fall, Zachry (Tom Hanks) must cope with his doubts, manifested as a demon called "Old Georgie" (Hugo Weaving), while he fights with his own faith in Somni upon the visit of one of the "prescients". All of these plot threads weave back and forth into one another, creating a quilt; and as some might tell you, a quilt can tell a story, creating a pattern of color and texture, from the blending of the different pieces connecting them. The principle actors adopt varied roles in the stories, in some cases playing half a dozen different people. Some of the people are similar to one another, and even occasionally share the same kinds of lines of dialogue. The echoes of these souls underscore the theme of a collective pool of souls, something which might superficially resemble reincarnation, but remains more inexplicable. For instance, each of these champions of these stories bears a kind of birthmark, resembling a shooting star; does this mean that the bearer of the mark is the same soul as his/her predecessor? Maybe...or perhaps each one of us has within us that mark, and each of us can grow from standing on the shoulders of our ancestry.
If Cloud Atlas represents a spectrum of our history and our civilization, it also represents a kind of microcosm for film in general. Various genres of film are explored throughout the vignettes in Cloud Atlas, from the high seas period piece about slavery to the comedic romp about the elderly fellow busting out of an old folks' home, from the cyberpunk sci-fi "not too distant future", the a full-blown post-apocalypse; even the tragic genius romance and political thriller are represented, with familiar tropes between them all. This generalization is not intended to reduce the film to a caricature of itself, but suggests that--like life--our interests in entertainment, in film, are also varied, and explore the breadth of our experience and imagination. No person watches exclusively drama or comedy, but well-rounded individuals seek to explore the gamut, because we are diverse and we wish to seek out new experiences, to understand our world around us better--that is the oft unspoken truth beneath our pursuit of art, of enlightenment, of entertainment. But for all the differing "genres" presented in Cloud Atlas, so many different "truths" are revisited in the film--what might seem a comical line gets revisited in even horrifying--but connected--ways later. For such differing stories, how can it be that so many similar things keep popping up throughout them? One might also ask the question why so many different struggles which have been a part of our history are still things we must cope with, and we realize that some elements of our existence are indelible and we will always be in conflict with them. For example, as more than a couple of characters attest, even separated by a vast span of time, "the weak are meat, and the strong will eat". While this adage uttered--or implied--by antagonists in these stories, it is undermined by the greater strength of character of the heroes in the tales, who thrive and survive because they are adaptable, diverse, and grow from their experience...more so, they share that experience with others, through story, music, and even film.
Recommended for: Fans of a story about humanity across time, of the good and evil within us, and the basic values we hold dear challenged throughout the ages, and about heroes like us in any time and place.
If Cloud Atlas represents a spectrum of our history and our civilization, it also represents a kind of microcosm for film in general. Various genres of film are explored throughout the vignettes in Cloud Atlas, from the high seas period piece about slavery to the comedic romp about the elderly fellow busting out of an old folks' home, from the cyberpunk sci-fi "not too distant future", the a full-blown post-apocalypse; even the tragic genius romance and political thriller are represented, with familiar tropes between them all. This generalization is not intended to reduce the film to a caricature of itself, but suggests that--like life--our interests in entertainment, in film, are also varied, and explore the breadth of our experience and imagination. No person watches exclusively drama or comedy, but well-rounded individuals seek to explore the gamut, because we are diverse and we wish to seek out new experiences, to understand our world around us better--that is the oft unspoken truth beneath our pursuit of art, of enlightenment, of entertainment. But for all the differing "genres" presented in Cloud Atlas, so many different "truths" are revisited in the film--what might seem a comical line gets revisited in even horrifying--but connected--ways later. For such differing stories, how can it be that so many similar things keep popping up throughout them? One might also ask the question why so many different struggles which have been a part of our history are still things we must cope with, and we realize that some elements of our existence are indelible and we will always be in conflict with them. For example, as more than a couple of characters attest, even separated by a vast span of time, "the weak are meat, and the strong will eat". While this adage uttered--or implied--by antagonists in these stories, it is undermined by the greater strength of character of the heroes in the tales, who thrive and survive because they are adaptable, diverse, and grow from their experience...more so, they share that experience with others, through story, music, and even film.
Recommended for: Fans of a story about humanity across time, of the good and evil within us, and the basic values we hold dear challenged throughout the ages, and about heroes like us in any time and place.