The Wachowski Burden: The Ghastly Ordeal of Cloud Atlas

I like to say I was raised by my mom, my dad, and HBO.  I know the HBO FEATURE PRESENTATION song by heart and when I hear it, to this day, I power dance with my fist pointed to the heavens.  It's probably really weird to watch, like stumbling upon savages praying to a pagan god.  That's because movies are my religion.

I went to film camp when I was 17 to learn how to make movies, and made a Star Wars inspired comedy about a kid whose life was "ruined" by American Pie.  [It was definitely inspired by sadly apt comparisons I got to "the Sherminator".]

He and his friend, who speaks through his Yoda pez doll, overcame a bully, and at the climax, Yoda Pez says "Suck my lightsaber, you will."  Star Wars, American Pie, movies movies movies.

The first day of class, our teachers asked us to raise our hands if we'd seen the movie in question.  RUSHMORE, most of the class.  CLERKS, maybe fewer.  SHAWSHANK?

Me.

You... haven't seen Shawshank?

No.

The Shawshank Redemption.

No, I know.  I haven't seen it.

That summer was supposed to be about finding my kind.  I had left unsophisticated-jock-jerk world to be welcomed by my cool nerdy-smart brethren.  I could be cool and popular!  But in literally the first hour of our summer-long program I was made to feel shamed.  Over Shawshank.  

Just over 10 years later, I still haven't seen Shawshank.  I used to be more proud of that, hence the following birthday invitation:

And then, SPEED RACER happened.  It was a love letter to cinema, a rainbow soaked battle of art vs. commerce, a 22nd century Kubrick... it doesn't matter.  The movie tanked, the critics hated it, I heard it sucked, were you on drugs when you watched it?

Suddenly I was back in that classroom, only the situation was reversed, and I was swimming against the tide of conventional wisdom.  To me, Speed Racer was so much an optimistic and cautionary tale of cinema's power and future, and I practically had to beg friends to see it.  I still do.

This weekend I saw CLOUD ATLAS.  I loved it.  A triumph.  And yet here I am again, right where I started with Speed Racer.  A friend at a party after the movie: "I heard it sucked."  Eternal recurrence.

So now what?  Do I walk out of the classroom, or stay, make intellectual arguments, quote philosophers, rinse, lather and repeat?  (I'm sorry, I meant "pseudo"-intellectual, because god forbid our conversation gets pretentious)

I'm proud of all the positive things I've read about Speed Racer this past week.  It took a lot of passion on behalf of the fans to keep the conversation alive.  I hope and expect Cloud Atlas to have a similar fate, whatever that is worth.  For the Sonmis and Wall•Es, you never know.

As for me, I'll quote the scripture.

You think you can drive a car and change the world? It doesn't work like that!
Maybe not, but it's the only thing I know how to do and I gotta do something.