Watch it if you believe (or tend to believe) in reincarnation

Rating: 6/10 (4 January 2013)

I usually like epic 3-4 hours movies. Cloud Atlas is like watching several mini-movies with independent plots. Each actor is playing a different character in each plot, and time to time one of them says "oh, I remember this" for something he supposedly remembered from one of his past lives and these moments are the only connection between the plots.
Yes, the old guy repeating "I know, I know" is funny. Sure, we all love Tom Hanks, And noticing in the credits who played each character may be surprising. But those wouldn't keep you entertained for 172 minutes.
I noticed there are multiple directors, this may be why the movie loses its focus throughout the stories.
I think the whole point of this movie seems "to convince you that reincarnation is real". If it is so, well, it didn't work for me, unfortunately I still don't believe in reincarnation.
So I think Cloud Atlas may be interesting for people who believe in reincarnation, for the rest of us non-believer souls, it is nothing more than a bunch of fancy pictures. I believe this is a highly overrated movie, and suffers similar issues with another overrated movie "Crash", which also had unnecessary effort to connect the stories with extraordinary coincidences. At least this one wouldn't get the Oscar, I guess :)