Metascore

Mixed or average reviews - based on 45 Critics What's this?

User Score

Universal acclaim- based on 482 Ratings

  • Starring: Halle Berry, Hugh Grant, Hugo Weaving, Tom Hanks
  • Summary: Based on the best-selling novel by David Mitchell, “Cloud Atlas” explores how the actions and consequences of individual lives impact one another throughout the past, the present and the future. Drama, mystery, action and enduring love thread through a story that unfolds in multiple lifetimetimes as one soul is shaped from a killer into a hero, and a single act of kindness ripples across centuries to inspire a revolution. Each member of the ensemble cast appears in multiple roles as the story moves through time. (Warner Bros. Pictures) Expand
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 21 out of 45
  2. Negative: 4 out of 45
  1. Reviewed by: Andrew O'Hehir
    Oct 26, 2012
    100
    Its too-muchness is also the source of its power; I was absolutely never bored, and felt surprised when the movie ended. It's an amazing, baffling, thrilling and (for many, it would appear) irritating experience, and for my money the most beautiful and distinctive big-screen vision of the year.
  2. Reviewed by: Ian Nathan
    Feb 18, 2013
    80
    Don’t let its commercial nosedive in the US tell the whole story. Cloud Atlas is a tough sell, but a rewarding journey all the same. It’s an adventure into the very concept of storytelling: magical, enthralling and thrilling as much as bewildering, pompous and potty. In other words, up in the clouds.
  3. Reviewed by: James Mottram
    Feb 9, 2013
    60
    A grand folly that makes the Wachowskis’ "The Matrix" trilogy look prosaic, Cloud Atlas is a fascinating if flawed work that will leave you gasping one minute and gagging the next.
  4. Reviewed by: Kyle Smith
    Oct 25, 2012
    25
    I'll grant that the film has many layers. All of them are terrible.

See all 45 Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Negative: 24 out of 160
  1. This was a remarkable movie, and I enjoyed every minute of it. I did not read the book but now I intend to. I understand that this is not a movie for everybody, but it's a movie for adults. The music and editing was so well done and that is just a cherry on top of this homage to film, love, life, freedom and what it all means to us. Brilliant!!! Expand
  2. 8
    Not quite understanding all the hate for this film. It's really like nothing else I've ever seen, with each parallel story differing in scope and scale but matching in emotion and entertainment value. This movie gives you a lot to think about when you leave the theatre, but while you watch it, it washes over and envelops you like great cinema should. Expand
  3. The movie was nothing special. It was 40 minutes longer than it supposed to be. The stories (and the story as a whole) was cliché ridden and very predictable. The "meaning" or "message" of the movie could be told in 20 minutes. I did not like how the directors cast their actors to different sexes, races. I think it was very distracting at some points. I did not like that some stories were too "funny" (retirement home storyline) and some stories were very dark in tone (Neo-Seoul storyline). I didn't feel the stories were coherent enough. Maybe with less directors it could have been a better movie. Overall average. Expand
  4. It tries too hard to tell 6 stories that simply are not interesting either independently or related to one another.
    Some of the make-ups were
    just atrocious. Expand

See all 160 User Reviews

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