( Note: to avoid confusion we will mostly refer to the characters by the names of the actors who play them.)Ī ship crossing the Pacific in 1849 the home of an elderly composer in 1936 Edinburgh San Francisco and a nearby nuclear power plant in 1973 London and an Edinburgh nursing home in 2012 Neo-Soul, the capital of a half-ruined Korea in 2144 a valley and a mountain on a post-apocalyptic Hawaii in 2321. Here is a guide to the karmic chameleons of Cloud Atlas. See Tom Hanks? Then you’ve got the recovering soul who starts off bad but will become (mostly) good over the course of his journey.

(In the book, you could track the reincarnation by the bodies that shared a comet-shaped birthmark in the film, the birthmark just signals our protagonists, and the actor triggers the reincarnation.) See Hugo Weaving? Then you’ve got the bad soul who will only get worse over time. Tracking those actors is somewhat key to understanding the connective plot, in which various souls are reincarnated or migrate over time - crossing the ages like clouds cross the skies.

Actors play multiple roles across the film, switching ages, races, and even genders from tale to tale. Each of the six intertwined stories takes place in a different era and assumes the tropes of completely different genres. If you’ve watched Cloud Atlas and you’re still a bit confused, it’s easy to see why.

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