Cloud Atlas (Movie)

[Ideologue]

CONCUR.

[Ideologue]

It looks like it could be a good film...but then I thought the same thing about "The Fountain", and this appears almost similar.

I will cop to liking The Fountain.

I really liked The Fountain.  One of the saddest Goddamned movies I've ever seen.

It's fatal flaw, however, is that Rachel Weisz' book is complete shit.  It does well enough as one leg of the Fountain tripod, but next time you see it, imagine it as a standalone work.

[DontSayBanana]

Ugh.  Gonna have to find time to see it myself.  Unfortunately, most movie-watching for me happens with S and her parents, who thought The Rum Diary was too "boring" (re: pretentious and confusing).

[Eddie Teach]

It's fatal flaw, however, is that Rachel Weisz' book is complete shit.  It does well enough as one leg of the Fountain tripod, but next time you see it, imagine it as a standalone work.

I quit watching during that part. The conquistadors looking for the fountain of youth bit was alright, but then the near future bit with Weisz and Jackman and some tree dragged on forever...

[Ideologue]

THE FUTURE TREE WAS THE BEST PART.

[Eddie Teach]

It wasn't the tree itself that annoyed me, it was mostly them talking in a kitchen I think. I just remember that the tree had some great unknown(to me) significance.

[Syt]

I actually liked The Fountain. I like it when movies sometimes defy rational analysis (think 2001 end sequence).

[Habbaku]

I eagerly await reviews because there's no way in Hell I'll go see a Wachowski Brother-Sister-It film sight-unseen.

Stay classy, bro.

Though in substance you've got a point.

Google Lana Wachowski and suffer.

[Josquius]

It does look and sound absolutely awesome.
These reviews however scare me.

[Martinus]

I eagerly await reviews because there's no way in Hell I'll go see a Wachowski Brother-Sister-It film sight-unseen.

Nice transphobia there with the "it" reference. You redneck piece of crap. The only thing that qualifies as the collection of "its" is the gene pool you crawled out of.

[Gups]

I'm intrigued and have ordered the book. If Gups and Malthus recommend it, it's good enough for me.

That's very flattering.  But I gotta warn you - the book is not universally loved either.

Basically, it deals with the interactions between six wholly different stories in different genres and set in different times. The "fun" is in seeing exactly what these connections consist of. There are at least three different layers of connections - one is simple: the recording (in whatever form) of one story features, if tangentally, in another (a character in the 1920s reads a journal written by the 1840s character, that sort of thing); another is that it is possible that the characters are reincarnations of earch other (in the book at least, this is dealt with as a mere suggestion); but more importantly, they are connected thematically - the stories all consist of variations on a theme. This is referenced in the title, which is the title of a piece of music written by one of the characters in one of the stories - the "Cloud Atlas Sextet".

It really is quite clever and I think works surprisingly well. But some find it confusing and/or overly pretentious. It would not have worked were it not for the fact that the writer makes the individual stories both unique and interesting (while still keeping thematic unity) - at least, in my opinion. 

One thing I think everyone who reads it would agree on, is that it would not be easy to make it into a film.

Personally I enjoyed the stories in their own right as novellas and didn't worry too much about connections between them.

They are all, in themesleves, very easy to read and not at all pretentious. They are genre pastiches - noir, dystopia, C19th travelogue etc.  Mitchell has mixed success with these - some are average but others (particularly the Brave New World rework) are outstanding.

I've read all of Mitchell's published work and Cloud Atlas is typical. Easy to read, interesting, fizzing with ideas but flawed mainly because he tries too much. As he matures as a writer I think he will settle down.

[Martinus]

I'm intrigued and have ordered the book. If Gups and Malthus recommend it, it's good enough for me.

That's very flattering.  But I gotta warn you - the book is not universally loved either.

Basically, it deals with the interactions between six wholly different stories in different genres and set in different times. The "fun" is in seeing exactly what these connections consist of. There are at least three different layers of connections - one is simple: the recording (in whatever form) of one story features, if tangentally, in another (a character in the 1920s reads a journal written by the 1840s character, that sort of thing); another is that it is possible that the characters are reincarnations of earch other (in the book at least, this is dealt with as a mere suggestion); but more importantly, they are connected thematically - the stories all consist of variations on a theme. This is referenced in the title, which is the title of a piece of music written by one of the characters in one of the stories - the "Cloud Atlas Sextet".

It really is quite clever and I think works surprisingly well. But some find it confusing and/or overly pretentious. It would not have worked were it not for the fact that the writer makes the individual stories both unique and interesting (while still keeping thematic unity) - at least, in my opinion. 

One thing I think everyone who reads it would agree on, is that it would not be easy to make it into a film.

Don't know why or whether this actually makes sense but my thought after reading your description: this sounds like devised by someone with a mentality shaped by computer and/or pen-and-paper roleplaying games. I had the same feeling when reading Song of Ice and Fire. This is a total departure from the old fashioned storytelling and I can see why people who are used to it find it familiar (i.e. like it) and people who aren't used to it, hate it. What do you think?

[Eddie Teach]

Problem with that is movies generally don't have enough time to devote to a dozen different threads. The result tends to be confusion and shallow characters and underdeveloped plot lines. There are exceptions; Sin City springs to mind. But you really have to hit the ground running.

[CountDeMoney]

Don't need to read the book to recognize a pretentious, over-produced film targeted specifically for the masturbatory Timmay Assburger demo.

How did I get tagged as a fan of pretentious films? 

My tastes are famously low class.

Because you're a sucker for gimmcky movies, like some moron native enamored and hypnotized with trinkets and baubles and boomsticks offered for trade by colonial Michael Bay types. 

[CountDeMoney]

I eagerly await reviews because there's no way in Hell I'll go see a Wachowski Brother-Sister-It film sight-unseen.

Nice transphobia there with the "it" reference. You redneck piece of crap. The only thing that qualifies as the collection of "its" is the gene pool you crawled out of.

Lighten up, faggot.  Nobody gives a fuck about your fruity ass politics this early in the morning.