Cloud Atlas - Musings Existential

Full of cold and feeling miserable, I wasn't sure if I was ready to brave the three hour mountain that is the Wachowski and Tykwer's sci-fi epic, Cloud Atlas. However, within three minutes I became as one overdosed with Lemsip as the stuffy nose and raspy chest melted away and I became immersed in this truly wonderful cinematic adventure.
The film opens with a wizened and scar-ridden Tom Hanks seemingly relating a rather bizarre history lesson. Tattoo-ridden and beneath a starry sky we soon realize this film is going to be something different. Adapted from David Mitchell's (no, not the one from Peep Show) best-selling novel, the film deals with six different narratives spanning hundreds of years, all sharing some loose connection. Think Pulp Fiction on acid. What this gives us is a movie of such scope that you emerge three hours later feeling as if you've been 'chasing the dragon'; your mind awash with the questions the film poses. Why are we here? Is there some higher power? Do we ever really cease to exist? Perhaps the most interesting way in which the film deals with these conundrums is the fact that the majority of the cast play multiple roles, some portraying as many as six. We are given Tom Hanks as a villainous ship's doctor, a tribal goat herd, and a psychotic Irish thug, to name but three! Jim Broadbent, forever sublime, gives a wondrous turn as a dodgy publisher and is perhaps the most amusing and entertaining of the different narratives. Special kudos I believe though has to go the wonderful Ben Whishaw, perhaps our best young actor today, and Doona Bae, a South Korean actress whom I hope we will be seeing much more of. Involved in the most technologically stunning of the narratives, Bae's performance as the artificially created 'fabricant', Sonmi-451 is deeply haunting and draws shocking parallels with events not to distant in our own history. It is also worth noting how good it is to see Hugh Grant back on the big screen, stepping out of his comfort zone in remarkable style, proving yes Mr. Grant, you can act!

Other than the visionary direction from Lana Wachowski, Andy Wachowski and Tom Tykwer, as well as the wonderful ensemble work from the cast, the third guest at this mind-bending party has to be the music. Taking the film's title from the composition of Ben Whishaw's main character, Cloud Atlas, refers to the Cloud Atlas Sextet, a piece of music that binds many of the characters throughout the various narratives. Composed by Tykwer himself, along with his longtime collaborators Reinhold Heil and Johnny Klimek, the score is deeply rousing and putting it simply, beautiful. One can see how in the multiple narratives the various characters are so transfixed by its power and beauty. The score ultimately serves as another method of signalling what the directors want to achieve; to demonstrate, as Susan Sarandon's prophet-like Abbess states, 'Our lives our not our own. We are bound to others, past and present.'

I leave you with the extended trailer, and implore you, for the sake of your own soul, to see Cloud Atlas.