Now, calm down. I know there are people out there who are going to hate this movie. There are people who take life way too seriously, and for some reason, take entertainment even more seriously. Did you know not all movies are documentaries? It turns out many, many more movies are meant for entertainment purposes, and Nobody achieved that while igniting the midlife crisis in me.
*Spolier Alert*
The First Couple Minutes of this Movie Made Me Feel Like a Nobody
One thing in my life I’ve always fear is getting into a mundane routine that offers no variety or excitement in life. The first couple minutes of Nobody shows us exactly that – Hutch Mansell, portrayed by Bob Odenkirk, lives not a Groundhog Day lifestyle, but a Groundhog Week.
That kind of life, I would think, nobody would want to live.
Of course, his past and who he truly is catches up to him. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have a movie!
The close ups, the quick cuts, the rhythm of the audio puts you in Hutch’s shoes and makes one (at least me, anyways) not want that kind of life. Odenkirk’s portrayal of Hutch gives us the sense that he’s bottling something he really doesn’t want to bottle up. Perhaps the trailer told us that too!
It is Your Corrupt We Claim
Within these couple minutes, I found myself pondering another life theory: Should this man of awesome skill bottle up his urge to purge evil? Of course, he was working for the CIA, so we’re under the presumption that Hutch thinks he is doing good by destroying those the government consider evil. Not to get into the whole political aspect of it, but does Hutch’s belief that he is doing good forgive the aspect that he’s actually doing only what the government considers good?
Of course, the vigilantism in cinema has its plethora of heroes. The absolute first that comes to my mind are the MacManus brothers from The Boondock Saints. Nobody has a lot of parallels to Boondock Saints, so if you enjoyed Nobody and you haven’t seen The Boondock Saints, what are you doing? Get over yourself and go see it now!
I, personally, would like to think by the end of the movie, Hutch prefers to handle business on his own. It turns out Hutch doesn’t need government backing to get the job done. The movie does leave a lot of backstory open and there is plenty of room for sequels (which can be a good or bad thing). I can see, and would love to see, this franchise mirror the first three Captain America movies from Marvel.
Steve Rogers goes from government stooge to abandoning that role and standing against the institutions that provided a false face to what his calling was. Hutch Mansell could have a similar, and even more entertaining if done correctly, story arc.
This all leads to the ultimate question: Is it OK for good people to do bad things for the personal good?
Embarrassed by Standing Down
One quick moment I’d like to discuss is how Hutch dealt with letting the people who broke into his house go. He obviously made a humane decision here (even after his teenage son’s amazing tackle on one of the intruders), which we find out why later in the film.
However, in the aftermath of the intrusion, there was but a moment of a few frames in which he turns to the camera but halts, and you get a hair’s glimpse into his eyes. Was he too embarrassed to keep eye contact with us? Of course, this wasn’t a fourth wall breaking movie, but this moment, if is in the movie on purpose. is gold!
But of Course, Nobody Was Dumb Sometimes
Stronger than a Starship Trooper?
We’re not going to touch on the continuity issues with the damage to Hutch. That’s too apparent.
If you ask me, Hutch could even turn out to have some supernatural healing ability (of which I desperately hope they don’t do if there are sequels) with the amount of damage he takes. Do you remember that really dumb moment in my favorite guilty pleasure film, Starship Troopers?
Carmen Ibanez (I didn’t have to look that up) was in the brain bug cave with Zander when she took a Warrior Bug stab through the shoulder. Like all the way through. By like two feet.
After the brain bug is dealt with by newly demoted Private Zim, Johnny Rico and Carmen meet up with Carl and the three celebrate this big victory on the war with the bugs. However, you would never know Carmen just 10 minutes ago had been stabbed two feet through her shoulder!
Hutch doesn’t quite take a beating like the Navy Seal supposedly did in Lone Survivor, but it was quite a beating regardless. All of his cuts, bruises, piercings, and breaks seem to only last 10 minutes. I mean, check out some of these injuries:
- Stabbed in the gut during a brutal 5-on-1 fight.
- Breaking his hand to slip out of some handcuffs before surviving a roll over in the trunk of a car.
- Shot in the shoulder before the last stand in the warehouse.
Adrenaline goes a long way, but injuries tend to hang around unless you’re Hutch Mansell! I injured my pinkie with a box cutter a couple months ago, and I still feel it to this day!
Some Minor Dumb Moments in Nobody
Nobody obviously is violent fun. Any weirdo who takes notice to any minor discrepancies in the film must be an idiot.
Well, this idiot believes that if you have a budget of $16,000,000, small errors should be avoided at all costs.
*Note – $16,000,000 is actually quite a bit less than I expected for Nobody’s budget. Derek Kolstad created the much beloved John Wick series, and you can tell his hands were all over Nobody. Surprisingly, Kolstad will not have any business with the next two John Wick films.
Dumb Moment #1: At the beginning when the intruders are in his house, Mansell has the opportunity to ambush them. He comes across his golf clubs and grabs a 3 wood (or something, I’m not the biggest golf enthusiast). I think he should’ve grabbed an two iron. There isn’t a lot of room to swing the longer 3 wood in the house, and the iron head would be more devastating.
Dumb Moment #2: In the bus fight scene, Hutch stabs one of his assailants in the forearm. Blood oozes from the stab wound ridiculously, but when they cut to a wider shot of the encounter, there’s zero blood on the arm!
Dumb Moment #3: Yulian’s introduction (of which I appreciate the long take) may not be that dumb. You tell me! His black SUV went flying by his club, so he makes his driver hop the median and drop him off on the other side of the street. If the driver simply just pulled over, Yulian would’ve made it to his club faster. He also should’ve punished his dumbass driver for passing the club. This would’ve shown us right off the bat how dangerous Yulian is.
More Dumb Moments from Nobody
Dumb Moment #4: I’m not a Microsoft Excel expert, but the spreadsheet they had an EXTREME close up on at one point didn’t make sense. Where the text cursor was flashing – there should’ve been a value function in that cell.
Dumb Moment #5: When the highly trained SWAT-like team of Russians invade Hutch’s house, one of them enters a room without pieing the corner. He just ran gleefully straight forward like he was a drunk frat guy going towards some booty on the dance floor!
Dumb Moment #6: Hutch ends up burning the bodies left in his house. He pulls them into the basement, claiming it’ll burn at 3,000 degrees, twice of what a bone needs to turn to ash. By the time he leaves the house, it’s way up in flames – enough where the whole neighborhood is out to see it before he leaves. He ends up stealing his arrogant neighbor’s car. We don’t get to see the arrogant neighbor’s reaction, which makes me believe it was cut out for some reason.
Dumb Moment #7: I am not a ballistics expert, but at one point, Hutch is driving away from Yulian and his gang. Yulian orders them to chase down Hutch before he shoots at Hutch. Somehow, a bullet goes through one window of Hutch’s car and then goes clean through the windshield. Is it just me, or is that a crazy amount of power for a pistol? Maybe it was a dessert eagle or something.
Dumb Moment #8: The claymore. Hutch charges at Yulian with a claymore attached to what I presume is bulletproof glass. Yulian doesn’t think to shoot Hutch’s legs for some reason, so Hutch engages the claymore not but one foot away from Yulian. Yulian dies, but he should have DIED – I’ve never seen first hand what a claymore can do to a human being, but part of me says Yulian’s upper third should have been dust!
One Sequence I Would’ve Extended
As I’m watching a movie, sometimes I get ultra pumped up, only to be let down! After the car chase scene, Hutch gets away and the camera stays on Yulian. A car pulls up to Yulian and he gets in. The movie then cuts to Hutch’s warehouse, his last stand.
In this scene, I would’ve loved it so much if the camera just stayed with Yulian. For some dumb reason, I’m very fond of long takes. I feel this would’ve been a potentially great low-intensity chase scene before Hutch’s final stand. It could’ve done more to build Yulian as a character as well.
Nobody’s Highlights
Favorite Quote from Nobody
It’s hard to say what my favorite quote from the movie is. There were handful of great lines I jotted down throughout Nobody.
But if I had to pick one, it would be an interaction between Hutch and his dad, Frank.
Hutch: “You brought a lot of shotguns.”
Frank: “You brought a lot of Russians!”
Somewhere in there, there could’ve been a “3 Russians, 1 bullet” line as well!
Some Great Moments from Nobody
Every action scene in this movie was worth the value of the ticket.
Yulian’s performance on stage shows how charismatic a sadistic psychopath can be. His associates even addresses that performance, and Yulian builds their confidence in him in less than 30 seconds.
When we finally get to learn more about Hutch’s backstory, the Black Russian Pavel is dying. When Hutch looks at Pavel, he’s already dead. “But when did he die during Hutch’s story?” You don’t need to know that. He’s dead.
Seemless transitions are a favorite of mine. From one scene to another, the camera tilts up to the moon, only to come back down to a new location and scene. Easy to recreate, yet very effective. Hey, Tarantino says it’s perfectly fine!
One of my favorite scenes from the movie is when Hutch buys the warehouse from his father-in-law. Hutch throws down a bag of gold bars, which, depending on the weight, could’ve easily been millions of dollars. His father-in-law instantly takes the deal, while his whiny brother in law stands up to protest. Hutch quickly gives him a gut punch and the dad doesn’t care at all!
The family dynamic with the Mansells is fun to watch. I didn’t even talk much about Hutch’s Dad, purposely, because I want you to bask in the greatness that is Christopher Lloyd!
Final Thoughts on Nobody
If this movie left me with one question for myself, it is “What is my life and what does it mean?” The last couple years of my life have become stale. Is it destined to become the first couple minutes of Nobody?
Of course I don’t believe so, and neither should you! Your path is what you make of it. Take ownership of your life and do what you need to do. You never know how things will turn out.
Yes, Nobody is a fictional movie, but your truth is what you make it. Movies are dumb sometimes, but don’t let the dumbness let great inspiration leave you in its wake.
This is definitely a movie you should enjoy in a theater. Don’t wait for it to come out on video. If you don’t want to see it full price, see it on a Tuesday or a matinee!
This movie has all the room in the world to produce a handful of sequels and prequels. Let’s hope they’re made.
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