"Even as I was watching "Cloud Atlas" the first time, I knew I would need to see it again. Now that I've seen it the second time, I know I'd like to see it a third time — but I no longer believe repeated viewings will solve anything. To borrow Churchill's description of Russia, "it is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma." It fascinates in the moment. It's getting from one moment to the next that is tricky. Surely this is one of the most ambitious films ever made. The little world of film criticism has been alive with interpretations of it, which propose to explain something that lies outside explanation. Any explanation of a work of art must be found in it, not taken to it."

"Halle Berry"

"Clouds do not really look like camels or sailing ships or castles in the sky. They are simply a natural process at work. So too, perhaps, are our lives. Because we have minds and clouds do not, we desire freedom. That is the shape the characters in "Cloud Atlas" take, and how they attempt to direct our thoughts. Any concrete, factual attempt to nail the film down to cold fact, to tell you what it "means," is as pointless as trying to build a clockwork orange. But, oh, what a film this is! And what a demonstration of the magical, dreamlike qualities of the cinema. And what an opportunity for the actors. And what a leap by the directors, who free themselves from the chains of narrative continuity. And then the wisdom of the old man staring into the flames makes perfect sense."

"Why words slink n' slide off a tongue, when we need them most? If my tongue'd been more bold, could I have stopped all that diresomes about to happen?"

"Now kin n' bros n' half-strangers, yay, even the Abbess, all come knockin', to gape in wonderment like Sonmi herself was sittin' in our kitchen."

"Prescients come barterin' twice a year, their ships creep-crawlin' on waves, just floatin' on the Smart o' the Old Uns."

"Questions about Prescients n' their whoahsome Ship poured thick n'fast... No one queried what fusion engine was... cos they didn't want to look stoopit in front o' the gatherin'. True really was, Meronym answered the questions, but no answer ever quenched your curio. All o' that answerin' done was teach everyone to not trust her, nay, not a flea..."

"Lonesome night. Babbits bawlin', wind bitin' the bone. Wind like this full of voices. Ancestry howlin' at you, yibberin' stories. All voices tied up into one. One voice different, one voice whisperin' out there, spyin' from the dark. That fangy devil Ol' Georgie hisself. Now you hear up close and I'll yarn you about the first time we met, eye to eye."

"Jim Broadbent"

"Nay, this life all rot n' luck n' no smilin' in some yarnin'. In rear's time, I ever fessed the secret of Sloosha's Hallow. Adam, my bro' by law, n' his son n' me be trekkin' back from Honokaa Market. It was Adam's custom to kowtow his ancestry with offerin's n' honorin's. Suddenwise, that fangy devil's eyes, I felt'em."

"...goats, and so do herders, they're known for housing temper."

"My thoughts? If I'm honest, I admit that the obvious emotions like shock and horror flew as Finch had, here and gone... While deep down, I experienced a nascent sense of a silver lining to this most tragic turn."

"I was for the briefest of moments... Cinderella and all memory of past misfortune receded in the rearview mirror of my dream come true."

"What is a critic but one who reads quickly, arrogantly, but never wisely?"

"I will not be subjected to criminal abuse."

"In the darkness, I suddenly saw the light. Blood has always trumped water. If the Hogginses brutes wanted to turn this into a family affair, they'd find the Cavendish clan more than ready for the task at hand."

"Freedom. The fatuous jingle of our civilization. But only those deprived of it have the barest inkling of what it really is."

"We cross and recross our old tracks like figure skaters."

"Composing is a crusade. Sometimes you slay the dragon. Sometimes it slays you."

"You can maintain power over people, as long as you give them something. Rob a man of everything, and that man will no longer be in your power."

"Knowledge is a mirror, and for the first time in my life, I was allowed to see who I was, and who I might become."

"I believe death is only a door, when it closes, another opens. If I care to imagine heaven. I would imagine a door opening. And behind it, I would find him there, waiting for me."

"To be is to be perceived. And so to know thyself is only possible through the eyes of the other. The nature of our immortal lives is in the consequences of our words and deeds that go on apportioning themselves throughout all time. Our lives are not our own; from womb to tomb, we are bound to others, past and present, and by each crime and every kindness we birth our future."

"You must have misheard me. I said I had a melody, not a malady!"

"Hugo Weaving"

"Truth is singular. Its "versions" are mistruths."