A set of six nested stories spanning time between the 19th century and a distant post-apocalyptic future. Cloud Atlas explores how the actions and consequences of individual lives impact one another throughout the past, the present and the future. Action, mystery and romance weave through the story as one soul is shaped from a killer into a hero and a single act of kindness ripples across centuries to inspire a revolution in the distant future. Based on the award winning novel by David Mitchell. Directed by Tom Tykwer and the Wachowskis.
An old leper who owned a remote sorghum winery dies. Jiu'er, the wife bought by the leper, and her lover, identified only as "my Grandpa" by the narrator, take over the winery and set up an idealized quasi-matriarchal community headed by Jiu'er. When the Japanese invaders subject the area to their rule and cut down the sorghum to make way for a road, the community rises up and resists as the sorghum grows anew.
Ali is 18. His feet are firmly off the ground. The very idea of marriage seems like a game. But the bride's parents are ready and willing. Business ventures will be set up between the families; the arrangement will pay off all round. Ali, meanwhile, is more interested in playing with puppets and dressing up as a rooster for the travelling theatre. His fiancée has only so much patience... So what should his parents do? What was that? Hire a Borrowed Bride? Meaning exactly what? Well just that: borrow a bride, as the title of the film suggests......
Twenty year-old Ki-chan lives alone with his father. One day Yoon-seo (Kim Jeong-ah), his stepmother comes to live with them. She tries to be friendly with Ki-chan but he appraoches her as a woman and starts showing her that. Yoon-seo strongly rejects him but he knows that she wants him too. Their relationship turns into something dangerous. Then one day, Min-jeong, who has had a crush on Ki-chan for a long time, finds out what is going on between the two. The young stepmother fools her husband and falls in love with his son and the son falls in love with his father's woman. They make a deal with Min-jeong to make sure she doesn't say anything.
Dominique, a well-trained assassin, flees from her troubled past in an attempt to begin a new life in South America. However, she soon finds herself in a town plagued with violence and corruption. Facing brutal attacks from the police and mafia, Dominique must decide whether to protect herself or an innocent family that has taken her in.