Cloud Atlas (2012)

Cloud Atlas (2012)

Available at Amazon.

Cloud Atlas is a 2012 German drama and science fiction film written, produced and directed by Lana and Andy Wachowski and Tom Tykwer. Adapted from the 2004 novel by David Mitchell, the film features multiple plotlines set across six different eras. During four years of development the project met difficulties securing financial support; it was eventually produced with a $102 million budget provided by independent sources, making Cloud Atlas one of the most expensive independent films of all time. Production began in September 2011 at Studio Babelsberg in Potsdam-Babelsberg, Germany.

The film premiered on September 9, 2012, at the 37th Toronto International Film Festival and was released on October 26, 2012 in conventional and IMAX cinemas.

Cloud Atlas polarized critics, and has subsequently been included on various Best Film and Worst Film lists. The film was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score for Tykwer (who co-scored the film), Johnny Klimek and Reinhold Heil.

The official synopsis for Cloud Atlas describes the film as:

An exploration of how the actions of individual lives impact one another in the past, present and future, as one soul is shaped from a killer into a hero, and an act of kindness ripples across centuries to inspire a revolution.

The film consists of six interrelated and interwoven stories that take the viewer from the South Pacific in the 19th century to a distant, post-apocalyptic future. Unlike the original novel, the film is structured, according to novelist David Mitchell, "as a sort of pointillist mosaic: We stay in each of the six worlds just long enough for the hook to be sunk in, and from then on the film darts from world to world at the speed of a plate-spinner, revisiting each narrative for long enough to propel it forward."

The six stories are:

• South Pacific Ocean, 1849: Adam Ewing, a young American lawyer from San Francisco during the California Gold Rush, has come to the Chatham Islands to conclude a business arrangement with Reverend Gilles Horrox for his father-in-law, Haskell Moore. He witnesses the whipping of a Moriori slave, Autua, who stows away on Ewing's ship, and convinces Ewing to advocate for him to join the crew as a freeman. Meanwhile, Dr. Henry Goose slowly poisons Ewing, claiming it to be the cure for a parasitic worm, aiming to steal Ewing's valuables. When Goose attempts to administer the fatal dose, Autua saves Ewing. Returning to America, Ewing and his wife, Tilda, denounce her father's complicity in slavery.
• Cambridge, England and Edinburgh, Scotland, 1936: Robert Frobisher, a 23-year-old bisexual English musician, finds work as an amanuensis to famous composer Vyvyan Ayrs, allowing Frobisher the time and inspiration to compose his own masterpiece, "The Cloud Atlas Sextet". At Ayrs' house, Frobisher reads a copy of Ewing's journal. Ayrs wishes to take credit for the piece, and threatens to expose Frobisher's scandalous background if he does not comply. Ayrs is shot by Frobisher, who flees to a hotel. There, he finishes his masterpiece and shoots himself only moments before his lover Rufus Sixsmith arrives to deter him.
• San Francisco, California, 1973: Luisa Rey is a journalist who by chance meets an older Sixsmith, now a nuclear physicist. Sixsmith tips off Rey to a conspiracy regarding the safety of a new nuclear reactor run by Lloyd Hooks, but is killed by Hooks' hitman Bill Smoke before he can give her the report that proves it. Rey finds and reads Frobisher's letters to Sixsmith. Isaac Sachs, another scientist at the power plant who seems to find her familiar, passes her a copy of the Sixsmith report. However, Smoke kills Sachs and also runs Rey's car off a bridge. With help from the plant's head of security, Joe Napier, she evades another attempt against her life, that results in Smoke's death, and exposes the plot to use a nuclear accident for the benefit of oil companies.
• United Kingdom, 2012: Timothy Cavendish, a 65-year-old publisher, has a windfall when Dermot Hoggins, the gangster author whose book he has published, infamously murders a critic and is sent to jail. When the author's associates threaten Cavendish's life to get his share of the profits, Cavendish turns to his brother Denholme for help. Denholme tricks him into hiding in a nursing home, where he is held against his will and treated poorly by the tyrannical Nurse Noakes. Cavendish and a few of his fellow "inmates" then plot a successful escape. Cavendish receives a manuscript of a mystery novel based on Rey's life.
• Neo Seoul, (Korea), 2144: Sonmi-451, a genetically-engineered fabricant (clone) server at a fast-food restaurant, is interviewed before her execution. She recounts how she was released from her compliant life of servitude by Hae-Joo Chang, a member of "Union", a rebel movement. While in hiding, she watches a movie based on Cavendish's adventure. The Union rebels reveal to her that fabricants like her are "recycled" into food for future fabricants. She decides that the system of society based on slavery and exploitation of fabricants is intolerable, and is brought to Hawaii to make a public broadcast of her manifesto. Hae-Joo and the other Union members are killed in a firefight ending in Sonmi's capture. After telling her story, she is executed.
• The Big Island of Hawaii on post-apocalyptic Earth (dated "106 winters after "The Fall", identified as 2321): Zachry lives with his sister and young niece Catkin in a primitive society called "The Valley" after most of humanity has died during "The Fall"; the Valley tribesmen worship Sonmi as a goddess. Zachry is plagued by visions of his people's perception of the devil, "Old Georgie" who manipulates him into giving in to his fear, leading to the murder of his friend and friend's son by the cannibal Kona tribe. Zachry's village is visited by Meronym, a member of the "Prescients", a society holding on to remnants of technology from before the Fall. In exchange for saving Catkin from a stonefish sting, Zachry agrees to guide Meronym into the mountains in search of Cloud Atlas, a communications station where she is able to send a message to people who have left Earth and now live on other planets. At the station, Meronym says that Sonmi was a human and not a goddess as the Valley tribes believe; Old Georgie almost convinces Zachry to kill Meronym for blasphemy but Zachry changes his mind after seeing a video of Sonmi. After returning, Zachry discovers the slaughter of his tribe at the hands of the Kona. Zachry kills the Kona Chief and rescues Catkin, but they are attacked by more Kona warriors and have to be rescued by Meronym. Zachry and Catkin join Meronym and the Prescients in a journey to a new world.

A seventh time period, several decades after the Hawaiian one, is featured in the film's prologue and epilogue. In the prologue, a lone, elderly Zachry delivers a monologue, and his location is not revealed. In the epilogue, Zachry is revealed to have been telling these stories to his numerous grandchildren on an alien planet with two moons in the night sky. Meronym emerges from their home and they embrace.

Hotel Transylvania (2012)

Hotel Transylvania (2012)

Available at Amazon.

Hotel Transylvania is a 2012 American 3D computer-animated comedy film produced by Sony Pictures Animation and distributed by Columbia Pictures. It was directed by Genndy Tartakovsky, the creator of Samurai Jack, Dexter's Laboratory, and Sym-Bionic Titan, and produced by Michelle Murdocca. The film features the voices of Adam Sandler, Andy Samberg, Selena Gomez, Kevin James, Fran Drescher, Steve Buscemi, Molly Shannon, David Spade and Cee Lo Green.

The film tells a story of Dracula, the owner of Hotel Transylvania, where the world's monsters can take a rest from human civilization. Dracula invites some of the most famous monsters, including Frankenstein's monster, Mummy, a Werewolf family, and the Invisible Man, to celebrate the 118th birthday of his daughter Mavis. When the hotel is unexpectedly visited by an ordinary 21-year-old traveler named Jonathan, Dracula must protect Mavis from falling in love with him before it is too late.

Released on September 28, 2012, the film was met with mixed critical reception, while the general population received it very favorably. Despite mixed reviews, Hotel Transylvania set a new record for the highest-grossing September opening weekend ever, earning a total of $324 million on a budget of $85 million. The film was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Animated Feature Film. A sequel, titled Hotel Transylvania 2, is scheduled to be released in theaters on September 25, 2015.

Dracula (Adam Sandler) is the owner and creator of Hotel Transylvania, a five-star resort where the world's monsters can be safe from human civilization. Dracula invites some of the most famous monsters like Frankenstein (Kevin James) and his wife Eunice (Fran Drescher), Murray the Mummy (Cee Lo Green), Wayne and Wanda Werewolf (Steve Buscemi and Molly Shannon), Griffin the Invisible Man (David Spade), Bigfoot, Steve the Blob, and other monsters to celebrate the 118th birthday of his daughter Mavis (Selena Gomez). However, Mavis prefers to explore the outside world with her father's permission, but the village he directs her to is actually an elaborate deception to convince her of the threat of humans enough to coax her back.

However, this charade inadvertently attracts the attention of an ordinary young traveler named Jonathan (Andy Samberg) who was exploring the surrounding forest and followed the staff to the hotel. Once Jonathan enters the hotel, Dracula frantically attempts to hide him from the patrons such as disguising him as a Flesh Golem named Johnny-stein with the later hasty cover story of being a relative of one of Frank's body parts. Eventually, Jonathan is discovered by Mavis and company, and gets magically attracted to Mavis, forcing Dracula to claim he is going to arrange Mavis' birthday party with a fresher perspective. In doing so, Jonathan manages to charm everyone at the hotel, especially Mavis. Eventually, even Dracula begins to like the human taking him into his confidence about his family's traumatic past after the vampire notices the young man knows something about them in a respectful manner.

Unfortunately, Chef Quasimodo Wilson (Jon Lovitz) realizes Jonathan is human and captures him to cook him, forcing Dracula to directly intervene by magically freezing the chef. Eventually, the birthday party happens and it is a raucous success until Dracula freaks out when Mavis and Jonathan have an innocent kiss. A ranting Dracula accidentally lets it slip that he tricked Mavis at the fake village and Mavis is outraged at being manipulated by her own father. Things get worse when a still-frozen Chef Quasimodo interrupts the party as the Fly (Chris Parnell) translates his frozen language to the clientele which states that Jonathan is actually a human. Even as the clientele are revolted, Mavis still accepts and expresses her desire to be with Jonathan even though he is human. For his part, Jonathan feels obliged to reject Mavis for her father's sake and leaves the hotel. Afterward, Dracula realizes that in his efforts to protect Mavis, he has broken her heart and now she tearfully wants to stay at the hotel forever.

Wishing to undo his mistake, and learning from a present from his late wife to Mavis about a zing when two people meet and fall in love, Dracula persuades his friends to help him find Jonathan and even risks his destruction by venturing out in the daylight to do so. Learning that Jonathan is about to board a flight out of Transylvania Airport shortly, they race on and enter a town en route. At that town, Dracula and company are stunned to see the humans having a 'Monster Festival'. To clear a path, Frankenstein tries to scare them, but finds the humans are cheerfully welcoming them instead and even provide a shaded route through the town for Dracula to proceed at maximum speed.

However, Dracula finds that he is too late with Jonathan's plane taking off. With no alternative, Dracula desperately flies after it in broad daylight in his bat form despite being hurt by the sun. With much effort, Dracula manages to reach the plane and resorts to mind-controlling one of the pilots (Brian Stack) and tells Jonathan that he wants him to return to be with his daughter and about the zing they made. Jonathan accepts Dracula's apology and Dracula manipulates the plane back to the airport.

Later, Dracula returns Johnny to Mavis, who tells her that she's his 'zing' and the reason why he had to reject her. Dracula gives his blessing to their relationship, Johnny and Mavis kiss and the hotel has another party to celebrate his daughter's liberating coming of age before Johnny and Mavis set off on their travels.

The film ends with Dracula and his friends being shown in traditional animation (in the style of Genndy Tartakovsky's cartoons) during the credits, as well as a few paintings of Johnny and Mavis on their travels together.