years ago i read david mitchell's ghostwritten wich i think is one of the best novels ever written, then i read cloud atlas, and that was even better. 
there's a whole group of literature that i've enjoyed over the years that is probably impossible to translate into film, it doesn't often work. croninberg did it with cosmopolis and naked lunch, sam mendes did it with the english patient, peter jackson with tolkien and then the wachowski's come along with their adaptation of cloud atlas.
this is an incredible film, intelligently transposed for film, its long, just under three hours but it's brilliant and despite the brutality in parts, despite the tragic story lines, it's incredibly validating of the human spirit and the only film i've seen in a long long time that one exits joyously. 
it's a complex story with complex themes but so close to the nature of human experience and why we suffer towards liberation, i wanted to just hug everyone in the world.