I think reception of Cloud Atlas is determined by "who you are and what you see."
I delighted in how the film deftly jumped from one "universe" to another, one genre to another, and all linked together in ways both seen and unseen, - my intellect adored a challenge like that. I wouldn't say I caught ALL the connections there were to catch, I wouldn't say I processed the film to the highest degree, but it was pure joy to attempt it, and in that respect the experience of watching Cloud Atlas reflected how (I presume) I ought to approach Life. It is only fun when you are challenged! For instance, I loved it when I was trying hard to grasp what the characters were saying in their future lingo, with only fragmentary success.
And every genre, every trick in film and storytelling, smashed together in some kind of Big Crunch that allows us to glimpse the infinite multiplicity of the Universe...
Just as one might understand the blueprint of nature when watching Animal Planet, so does one see the blueprint of Life, the Universe, and Everything when watching Cloud Atlas. It was a beautiful backdrop of multiple universes upon which is enacted the theological reality of "There is no God, everything just IS!" Yet, this blueprint is necessarily given incomplete treatment: while reincarnation and interconnectedness are strongly implied, higher densities - and possible "universes" occupied by those higher densities - are absent.
The line "Our lives are not our own" I interpreted thusly: when we see how each character's soul rerun is perceived by it to be "all there is," we contemplate how each rerun might be used to serve a higher purpose that transcends the lower natural order of reincarnation - if only the person in question cast aside his subjective circumstances in service of that higher purpose. And I am reminded of Ark writing something along the lines of being a vessel through which the Universe acts. We can dedicate our vessel to the Truth if we wish...
Could the film have been "more" than what it already is? I think perhaps, if the portrayed interconnectedness was taken to the order of magnitude of the Wave. Personal triumphs, overcoming the Predator, speaking the Truth as a revolutionary act, mythicization of Ancient Technology, transfer of people to another planet (an "Ark" of sorts) - all these are present. But what if actions taken during all those lives accomplished some Great Task that "bust the systems" of each and every one of those lives, past, present and future? (For example, what if the Cloud Atlas Sextet was involved in the TDARM process...what if the characters became conscious of their iterations...) Still, I love this film as it is. It is like a gift to third density.
My present state of knowledge has allowed me to receive Cloud Atlas as something of a C influence. Whether this was wise I do not know. I might decide to watch it again, and who knows what I'll see then?
The Wachowski films concerning Truth appeal to that part of me whose conscience is clear and questioning as a child's.
And a quote I like?[quote author=Sonmi-451]Truth is singular; its versions are mistruths.[/quote]
