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Paradoxically I think the main problem with Cloud Atlas is its lack of ambition. The Wachowskis and Tom Tykwer took a clever, elliptical, subtle novel by David Mitchell and turned it into an action movie. The Wachowskis seem fatally caught between two poles: on the one hand they love high ideas and high concepts but on the other they feel driven to provide audiences with with they assume will be crowd pleasing action sequences. Actually the bits of Cloud Atlas that work best are the quiet scenes between characters (especially where Jim Broadbent is involved) whereas the action scenes are dreary retreads of other movies that go on for far too long. I didn't mind the stuff they lifted from Terminator 2, or Lord of the Rings, but to steal from Star Wars: Attack of the Clones is unforgiveable... Cloud Atlas is unlikely to please fans of Mitchell's wonderful book (the best novel written by an Englishman in the last 10 years, if you ask me) or excitable fanboys expecting another Matrix. If the Wachowskis had trusted the material more then Cloud Atlas could have been something really interesting; perhaps in the hands of Ang Lee or Michael Haneke or even Lars Von Trier a film version of the novel might have worked, but alas it doesn't even come close here. I also wonder a little if the Wachowskis actually understood the book which is not about the immortality of the soul or the possibility of an afterlife (Brits are far too cynical these days to write novels about such topics). The performances in the movie were all perfectly adequate (Tom Hanks's awful Irish and Scottish accent work excepted) but Hugo Weaving stole the show - as usual - doing a lovely turn as Nurse Ratchet. And the one good thing about Cloud Atlas The Movie is how it has turned more people onto the book which I now see everywhere from the Safeway to the Walgreens, sandwiched between The National Enquirer, Jack Reacher and Fifty Shades of Gray
37 comments:
As I said earlier this week - try screenwriting - as well as the novels, ghostwriting, blogging - looks like you would be great at it. What have you got to lose? Do it for the Dead Trilogy first.
Happy New Year!
"The Wachowskis and Tom Tykwer took a clever, elliptical, subtle..."
Have three people ever successfully directed a movie together? (and how come Tykwer is let off so easily? That "Run, Lola Run" was a terrible action movie - three seperate chances and their only idea was to get the money from her rich daddy?...).
Until I worked on a movie set I had no clear idea of what a director did - and I still don't have a real handle on it, other than they answer about a thousand questions a day (and some, but not all, are even more involved in pre-production). So, usually the directors with the clearest vision and the most consistent answers to all those questions get the clearest movie - and movies these days seem to mostly be about clarity.
Deb
Its worth considering certainly.
John
I couldnt figure which director directed which bits but the influence is heavily Wachowski: big ideas told in a derivative way with a lot of action sequences that just went on forever.
There is one very funny line that wasn't in the book and I'd like to know who came up with it. Jim Broadbent is escaping from an old folks home and as he goes by the fogies who are staring at him through the window he says "Soylent Green is people..." That cracked me up.
(the best English novel of the last 10 years if you ask me)
Best by an author from England? Or best novel in English?
I also wonder a little if the Wachowskis actually understood the book which is not about the immortality of the soul or the possibility of an afterlife . . .
OK, but what IS it about? I've not seen the movie but I've read the book (twice) and so I've got my own opinion. I'm just curious about your thoughts.
Speedskater
Oh sorry, what I meant was best by an English author. There are loads of good American, Indian, Scottish, Irish novels out there...I didnt mean to be that broad. I'll correct the post.
Whats it all about? Well its about love and trust and freedom and the persistence of memes and the repetition of certain ideas and concepts across various times and various media. Its also about music which is the one aspect I was certain the film would do really well because you cant get music from a novel but unfortunately the score was generic and unimaginative when it should have been recursive and sly and beautiful...
Probably the most uneven, flawed film I saw in 2012 that I still think about (and not without a smile). I'd agree, too, that its best parts were the quiet ones. Thanks, Adrian.
What a sandwich! I believe I should skip the Reacher and the 50 Shades and reach instead for the Atlas. It is ironic that your indictment of the film has become for me an endorsement of the novel, which I will now seek out and read. After all, when you say it is the best by an Englishman in such a long span of time, that kind of hyperbole must be met head on with a reading. Thanks for the pointer. (And, as a bonus, I get to save $10 or more by skipping the movie!)
Leopard
Maybe I should talked a little more about how great Jim Broadbent is in this in this film. All my favourite moments were Broadbent scenes and if I do look back with a smile to any of it it'll probably be to his bits...
RT
Well, other opinions are available...If you dont like it dont by shy in telling me.
I got shat on my a lot of people on this blog when I championed another Mitchell book The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet which I loved but which seemed to rub a LOT of people the wrong way...
By jumping between timelines so much more frequently than the book, Cloud Atlas had me constantly either still thinking about a previous scene or wondering how a different storyline would resolve itself while watching a separate section (not sure that makes sense). It left me not concentrating fully on what was happening onscreen at a given moment.
That said, the effects and makeup were terrific and I'm glad I saw it in the theater rather than waiting for blu-ray.
Craig
The poor editor must have been having fits. It is a visual triumph with some extraordinary images in there but, as I say, it could have been so much more...or so much less if they'd just decided to leave well enough alone.
I was going to say that I have no interest in the movie, but Broadbent might make that a lie. I never thought the book would work as a movie--maybe as a BBC mini-series. I still think the book gimmicky, but in the end it won me over.
But what I really want to say is that Downton Abbey, Season 3 starts Sunday, and what I'm realizing is that it has become de rigueur to watch it. I don't usually use French phrases to describe a situation, but in this case, it seems absolutely right.
Seana
They lost me after they killed the pretty daughter.
But I hear they SPOILER ALERT
no really SPOILER ALERT
kill the heir to Downton because he hated the show and wanted out of his contract so it might be worth watching for that...
I think kill the pretty daughter might have warranted a spoiler alert, but since I'm not actually sure which one that was, it doesn't affect me that much. I like the idea that someone would still have enough spirit to want out of that franchise, so I might watch it just for that.
It's weird that I feel that I am almost bound to watch it in any case, but I sincerely feel no enthusiasm for it. We are apparently not scheduling any events that would conflict with it, though. I didn't know anarchist leaning Santa Cruz was so in love with the British aristocracy. Well, actually, it doesn't surprise me at all, because people are not at all what they think they are.
Seana
Thats what makes the British aristocracy so fucking insidious. Its easy to hate George W Bush but its harder to hate a blushing babbling Hugh Grant - fortunately I can do it.
Many Americans still don't hate George Bush, though. I don't even hate him now that he's safely out of office. Cheney is another matter.
What I like about Hugh Grant is that he is really such a bastard underneath the blushing. If you've ever seen An Awfully Big Adventure, you'll know that the narcissistic villain is always latent in him. And I bet he wishes he could play more like that.
I watched Downton Abbey. It gets a bit dull. The actor probably got a better, more interesting offer..
Try 'Call the Midwife' or 'Ripper Street'.
Blimey! Aristo bashing!! Bit generalist? Substitute any other group name, I dunno, the British working class, the British travelling population, the British Presbyterians, the black British population, followed by a derogatory comment, and it doesn't sound good.
Deb
The reason it works is because its about power isnt it? British blacks, Presbyterians etc. have no power but the aristos still do. Famously half of Scotland is owned by just 500 people.
But of course not all aristos are condescending, racist, bullying, snobbish arseholes but a surprising number still are, especially after a few drinks.
Sorry, couldn't resist this, because I knew you would come back with a pithy response!
I don't defend preferential treatment, bias etc - all of which are a pain in the arse.. Worst example for me was when I refused to curtsey (I can't even spell it) to a Dame someone or other at a university admissions (clearing) interview for medicine.. and so ended my prospects of a medical career.. Good riddance, of course, as I am having a fairly fascinating life...
Adrian - How many aristos do you know? and have seen drunk? ... I must be feeling like a fight, to be on the defensive here, over this topic. A leftie defending aristos?!
After a few drinks I am usually incoherent and unfocussed. I wouldn't say I behave like a wonderful human being,tho I doubt that I ever get to the stage of being a condescending, racist, bullying, snobbish arsehole. I say stupid things tho!
I take your point about a few wielding power and control - they aren't all aristos. We only have to look at the worldwide banking chaos and corrupt practices - no criminal charges in the UK at all for those at the top, as far as I have read. Meanwhile, rioters in the UK in 2011 received prison sentences galore, including some sentences for nicking loo rolls and bottled water (or was that someone who picked up a bottle of water, and then put it down again, but was seen by a copper?). I think around 3000 people were imprisoned.
It is difficult to change attitudes, particularly as folks seem less likely nowadays to stand up for their rights. I started at my workplace when it was closed shop, and I was very happy with that. Younger people seem to have a different view of unions, don't join them and have crossed my picket line - and then accepted the payrises that us strikers had helped bring about!
Communication through the internet makes the world a smaller place. Maybe it will bring a better understanding of fairplay and true democracy, but don't hold your breath.
It'll be interesting to see how Julian Fellowes American show works out. Back in the 70s when "Upstairs Downstairs" was a hit an American network tried something called "Beacon Hill" but it didn't work.
I've seen a grand total of one episode of "Downton Abbey" and I think it would be a tough sell to a wider American audience. There was a scene where a guy was ever so hopeful (sorry, that was cheap ;) that he might actually become Lord Somebody's valet! Then it was tragic that he didn't get the full-time job.
That aspiration is a very tough sell in America.
But shows don't really need a wide audience these days, niche is everything, and Downtown has a good one.
I think the greater portion of Santa Cruz is watching it, John, whatever that means. Well, that or sports.But it's definitely saving PBS's bacon. I think it's ALL pretty much niche marketing these days.
Yikes! Y'all bash DA and then throw in a huge spoiler. Not cricket, old sport, not cricket at all.
Deb
None until I went to Oxford and then quite a few. None all of them were assholes of course but enough were...
Seana, RT
Apologies for the spoiler I didnt quite realise how far behind PBS was.
It's okay for me, just don't give away anything about Breaking Bad that you manage to find out through your occult sources.
Sorry, RT, for helping stir the pot.
Well, the spoiler is out there, but I will not dare share it with anyone in my house unless I want a quick and painful death. Yeah, some here are really, really serious about DA.
At least I can still enjoy the acting, which is in most cases quite good.
Yeah, the scriptwriting is a bit soapy, but what the hell--it is supposed to be entertainment.
Oh, I'm not saying anything to my friends either.
You're right, the acting is far better than the script. As are the costumes, the setting, and pretty much everything else.
I like good soap, but this is not it.
no really I am sorry I had no idea you hadnt heard about the death,
SPOILER ALERT
deaths...
Downton Abbey fans should probably stop reading this thread right now. Well, about ten posts back, but it's too late for that.
Finally a post on Cloud Atlas I can agree with! The action scenes were overdone, all these
unnecessary complicated gadgets in the Neo Soul and post-apocalyptic parts and absolutely gratuitous action scenes took away any possible sincerity of anything said by the characters. 70s with Halle Berry had the very classical and uninventive thriller cliche feeling. In my opinion that are the main reasons that the (chronologically) first two storylines are way better in their own "modesty" and more introspective style of storytelling (although it's hardly perfect).
Just in the middle of the book now and loving it. But the screenwriter doesn't get credit for the "soylent green" line -- it's in the book.
Adrian ,Hopefully Writers Conference was a success.DId you see a new Haneke production called "Amour".Topic an elderly French couple grappling with aging and its consequences.It encompasses much and spares little but it might be a truly timeless love story.Since "The White Ribbon" Haneke might be the Bergman of our epoch.Another less known group of Directors are the Belgian Dardenne brothers who in film after film capture dysfunctional family affection in gritty Walloon towns.Unfortunately both play only to limited art show audiences perhaps this different in Europe.Best Alan
Gav
Damn, its in the book? So they really brought nothing interesting to the story at all then.
Alan
Yeah I've heard of Amour. It won best foreign language film at the Oscars and the leading lady was up for best actress.
I'm hot and cold with Haneke. I liked the White Ribbon very much, but I thought Cache was silly and I still dont know how I feel about Funny Games.
Adrian,I agree with you about Cache .Idid not see the other.I wanted to thank you for your recommendation for De Botton's book he makes serious thoughts fun. It is for me not a quick read.Thank you Alan
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