We’re sure at when writer/director Jaco Van Dormael first came up with the premise for “Mr. Nobody,” his first film in over a decade, it seemed like a fresh and original idea. Certainly we were intrigued by the time spanning tale about a man who wakes up in the year 2092 to find himself 120 years old, the oldest man in the world and the last mortal in a world where nobody dies. But, unfortunately, a number of other films have come along — “The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button,” “The Fountain,” “Inception” — that have also flirted with the territory of time and memory spanning love. To be certain, even if those films never existed, it wouldn’t make the achingly juvenile “Mr. Nobody” any better, but the fact that they do only makes the flaws in Dormael’s film stand out even more.
It’s hard to know where to begin addressing the myriad problems with “Mr. Nobody” but the setting seems like a good place to start considering that, ultimately, it has absolutely no bearing on the story. In short, there is no reason for this film to take place in 2092. Aside from allowing Dormael to play around with CGI and create a futuristic vision that seems lifted (with a smaller budget) straight from “The Fifth Element,” there is actually no plot driven basis for the film to be set in 2092 other than give Nemo/Mr. Nobody (Jared Leto) a place to die and tell his story. In fact, the film doesn’t even reveal why people are able to be immortal, why Nemo is excluded from being able to take part in this wonderful scientific breakthrough or how he’s been able to live so long. This is just the first of many major story situations where Dormael takes the audience’s trust for granted.
But, onwards, the story finally begins — after a muddled opening twenty minutes — when a reporter breaks into the hospital room where Nemo is staying in the future and asks him to talk about his life for posterity. Again, no reason is given why Nemo is being kept away from reporters other than it appears that he’s having trouble with his memory. As he recounts his story (which basically puts the rest of the film into a flashback) three separate versions of Nemo’s life emerge. Like the last season of “Lost” which dealt in parallel timelines, the same applies here, only Nemo’s memory is also remembering those of his parallel lives; those started and lived by another version of himself had he made or not made certain decisions at key points in his life. Again, the internal logic is never explained just presented for the audience to accept, but without a structural basis to make it stick. There is no explanation why Nemo can do this and why no one else can, it just is.
Nemo’s life appears to have been marked by two things: his parents’ (Rhys Ifans and Natasha Little) divorce and being the object of affection of girls in his elementary school days. CUE BUTTERFLY EFFECT. For (again) unexplored reasons, this is the turning point of his life and his parallel lives seem to diverge from here as we get plot threads for what would happen if he had chosen each girl. The rest of the film recounts these relationships in what is supposed be something dramatic and romantic (we suppose) but each life is so pathetic, so bereft of joy and riddled with discord it’s no small wonder that Nemo didn’t just off himself.
The first relationship with Jean (Linh-Dan Pham) is so briefly explored that it’s hardly worth addressing, but in this version of his life, he is extremely wealthy and unhappy because he keeps confusing dreams and memories from his other parallel lives and he thinks he is not leading the life he should.
Next is Anna (Juno Temple as the younger version, Diane Kruger as the older). In this alternate reality, following his parent’s divorce he goes to live with his mother who soon takes up with another man who has a daughter Nemo’s age. They fall in love, proceeding with an illicit affair behind their parent’s back, but are tragically ripped apart when things don’t work out between the adults. They run into each other later in life, even make plans to get together, but Nemo loses adult Anna’s number when a random event from halfway around the world causes a rainstorm to start where he is and a single raindrop to fall, and smudge the ink on the phone number he’s holding. No, we’re not kidding.
Finally, there’s Elise (Sarah Polley), a nearly suicidal depressive who is bedridden and crying when she’s not berating Nemo or scaring the bejeesus out of their kids with her wildly unpredictable behavior.
In setting up these ridiculous, overblown and tragic lives for Nemo, Dormael seems to have forgotten writing in the redemption he was looking for. The question of which one was real and which isn’t doesn’t really matter, but you also don’t want to find out because what Nemo goes through in one lifetime we wouldn’t wish on our worst enemy. Not only is Nemo the last mortal on Earth, he also seems to be the unluckiest person who ever lives, earning three sad sack alternate realities? Christ, in one of them, could he at least have been somewhat happy? We’re not even going to get into the storyline that has Nemo’s father turn into a cripple after this divorce, unable to wash or feed himself.
It also doesn’t help Dormael’s film that his female characters are either slavishly and blandly loyal (Jean), unattainable sexpots (Anna) or depressive and shrill (Elise). It seems the worst thing Nemo did in his life was have terrible taste in women. These are not so much characters that interact with Nemo as obstacles he has to overcome. Even though Polley is listed as the co-star, she’s in the film for maybe twenty minutes at most, most of which she is deep in the throes of a depression. Temple does the best she can with a role that requires her to do little more than act like a horny teenager while Pham seems to be mostly cut out of the film (indeed, there is a big sense that a lot was cut from the film while watching it).
While this writer can count the times he has walked out on a film on one hand, he has sat through enough films where he should have to know the warning signs. Here, that sign arrived loud and clear while Nemo gave the first of four lectures on physics and string theory directly to the camera during the Anna storyline (it appears he’s some kind of science show TV host, but again, that’s left unexplained as well). We had to stifle our laughter, but when Leto started in on the possibilities of time and space, we were ready to bolt and in retrospect, we really should have.
“Mr. Nobody” is simply a failure. While running pretty much the same length as “Inception,” “Mr. Nobody” doesn’t reward your patience nor engage your intellect. Borne out of a premise that sounds like something we might’ve thought of after a high school physics class while smoking a bowl (“dude, what if there were like, other versions of us out there…..whoa….puff puff pass….”) slapped together with the kind of crude, tragic romances that the tween set eats up with a spoon. Both overblown and half-baked, too long and not edited enough, “Mr. Nobody” describes exactly the kind of audience it will likely get. [D]
“Mr. Nobody” opens July 16th in Canada. There is no U.S. distributor in place yet for the film.
Can't say I agree with this review. I thought the film was lovely. Oh well. 🙂
I enjoyed it as well, Eric. Though the film does have it's flaws (I too was confused about why the old man bit was necessary), it is after all a fantasy, romantic and dream like.
The reason given for Nemo being able to experience his different lives was that the angel never pressed his lip like all the other unborn children.
Also, I rather enjoyed the science show explanation bits.
Oh yeah, totally forgot about that angels bit…..which was totally cornball anyway like much of the stuff in this film.
"achingly juvenile" is a fitting definition. the film is also way too ambitious and simply fails to deliver. but it should be said that the makeup job is terrific, and could at least make the shortlist at the oscars if the film gets a capable distributor there.
Whether the premise is cornball is certainly up to the viewer. Either you accept it and consider the film on it's own terms, or dismiss it as implausible and point to each fantastical element as further proof to your assumption. Every film of this sort requires a mechanism to break our normal boundaries of reality, whether it's a sci-fi contraption or a magic spell. I would agree that mixing angels and snippets of quantum jargon really doesn't make much sense, but if you can let that slide and consider the impossible weight of Nemo's choice I think you'll find what resonates with fans of this movie. There is something here outweighing the technical flaws. It encourages introspection, about our choices, and our relationships. Unlike Nemo, we only get one go of it. There are indeed far superior movies that share Nobody's themes, but I think it serves as an excellent primer for those not yet versed in such fare. Or… hehe.. maybe it's just us romantic saps that will enjoy this. At any rate, fans of alternate reality trips and beautiful cinematography ought to give it a try. It may have been better to avoid it's half-hearted sci-fi trimmings, but the emotional journey young boy will strike a chord with anyone who asks: "What if?"
Remember, it is all contained within the mind of a 9 year old boy. To fault it for breaking rules in our own world really doesn't make any sense.
I completely agree with this review, at first you enjoy the film but after being more detailed you find so many unexplored reasons in the film
I think you got it all wrong. Of course, the movie can be interpreted but I don't see how you came to the conclusion that the action is happening in Mr. Nobody's (the old man) time, or why how he got there and why he is not immortal like the rest of the world does matter. He is just a narrator. At the end of the movie he says that the reporter, himself and that whole world is just the imagination of an 8 years old child. He had to decide if he wants to live with his mother or father and in his mind he reviewed the possible lives he could have. Remember about that scene where he said every unborn child knows everything that will happen, and when it's their turn to be born the angels make them forget everything… but the angel missed him.
I also don't agree with your view on his relationships. He really loved Anna throughout the movie (remember the last thing he did before he died was calling her name) and the movie shows how his or her life would have been if he had met someone else.In fact he and Anna were mutually in love while his marriage to Elise was problematic throughout because he loved Elise while Elise loved Stephano so it was an empty marriage with Elise , meanwhile his life with Jean was similarly flawed, but the role was reversed Jean loved him while he married her without really loving her(just to get back at Elise's rejection in his teen years).In fact i think in his life with Jean he was wealthy and had everything but was in fact a hitman for hire that is why he died by being killed in a hotel room under a false identity and was only identified as Nemo by Jean in the morgue. So the only chance to happiness he had was to be with Anna. The Brazilian boiling and egg which caused the rain that erase Anna's phone number is an example of the butterfly effect (the theory is that tiny variations can affect giant systems, and complex systems, like weather patterns).
Another way to look at the movie is to see it as a near death experience of 15 year old Nemo after a horrible motorcycle accident.Remember the movie kept going to a scene of him in the hospital heavily injured and comatose.Plus there are about 3/4 scenes depicting an accident one is the obvious one where he falls off his motorcycle at high speed another is when he walks in the middle of the road and sees the headlights of a car about to hit him head on and they become two motorcycle lights on either side of him.In another scene he drives into a lake on his way from work when a bird hits his windshield and lastly when there is an explosion during a traffic jam that kills Elise but Nemo survives.So my view is that the only true accident was the one on the motorcycle as that was the point in life where after his thoughts could have wondered to what would have happened if he had not had the accident and had a relationship with Elise or Jean or even Anna, he also though in the other ways he could have ended up dying.All those other accidents were alternative ways in which he could have died in his other lives ,rather in an untimely fashion involving a motor accident.
It's a movie about life , love, choice , consequence, tentative outcomes , possibilities, what might have been. It just shows the viewer how our lives turn out the way they do and what unique circumstances are common to our own life as well as other peoples lives .For example in the movie nemo feared water and couldn't swim yet he almost drowned in the school pool as a kid, drowned in a car in a lake, got shot dead while in his bathtub which all shows a common thread that while some things in an alternative universe or life would change drastically, others may just change slightly but keep some common unique characteristics one could only describe as part of fate.
No matter how you see it, the movie is just too complex to be reduced to an old man's tragic story. This review is a disgrace to it's author.
I'm sorry to say that this is a very narrowminded review with a clear negative impression of the movie, making the interpretation of the movie likely negative.
For why I say this is that this masterpiece is for the openminded person who interpret the way they want to believe how the world look like.
If we look at the "cornball angels bit" as Kevin said that he totally forgot:
The religious one could interpret the scene as god creating life in the image of himself, but stripping him of his allknowing knowledge when prepared to live as a human.
The fantasy person would see it as another world sending the seed of life to earth.
or the boring science nerd (referring to myself)intepreting the angel scene as a methaphore for which higher dimensional intelligence would descend life constricted to 4 dimensions, but only a part of his mind, while the rest of his mind was left behind (forgotten) at higher dimensional planes giving him the ability to know every possible outcome of his life, even if his body will have to life through all of them.
These interpretations can be made throughout the movie.
To continue my scientific view of the film, I see it as everything that can happen has happened but he chooses to take us too those timelines which made the biggest emotional impressions in his "lives"; his three potential loved ones. He also lets us into a timeline less likely where he goes to mars. This is the timeline where he learns when the big crunch would occur.
As he managed to live to the end, he was able to see the world go backward in time making the the shattered world fall back into order, inverting entropy.
Im very sorry if I have offended you (Kevin Jagernauth, the reviewer) by writing this, but I think you should see the movie again intepreting it in another way more suitable for you. Less cornball for example.
Mr.Nobody is great film.I guess you have missed the point in the movie.
This is my opinion:
Nemo is boy that can predict the future.Thats why he ask himself in the movie:"why we cannot predict the future?"
Infact he knows the future and knows what will happen from a certain moment and the choises made at that moment.
The moment in the movie is when his parents are divorcing.He has to choose who he will live with.As a boy that knows the future he knows what will happen if he choses between his mother or his father.
With his mother there is possible choise that he will meet Anna and with his father elise and jean.With all this lives he will have,in non of them he ends with his true love(anna).All these stories(the old nemo,anna,elise,jean) are just consequence of the choise he makes at the station.And all of them are failiure.Thats why at the end he is chosing not to go with his mother nor with his father either.He goes in the woods ,takes a leaf and throws it.At the end , that means he choosed a completely new choise and that means a new life , where he is edning up with Anna(the leaf that he threwed at the end wakes him up in the future and finds Anna).How he meets with Ana in this life is not explained,but its surely explained that non of that lifes existed,they were just prediction.
I believe that this review is spot on!
The dialogue was cliched and just plain stupid in parts. "Gravity on Mars is .38 which is 3 times less than on Earth"
"You're incredible."
I'm sorry, what?
There is too much wrong with this movie to list in one comment. I would like to question the sanity of anyone who claims to enjoy this "masterpiece".
This movie has no substance and is just random scene after random scene.
For example, I don't understand how the homeless woman in the train station had any relevance to the plot other than Nemo and Anna reuniting by chance.
I went into this movie with an open mind as I had just recently watched Requiem for a Dream which also starred Jared Leto and high hopes for him in this movie as well.
But I felt as the movie progressed, I became more agitated and irritated at the lack of plot, direction and the level of artifice.
Just no.
Thank God someone else thinks this movie is shit. I absolutely agree with this review, what a stupid, long, boring, senseless movie. A waste of time
This movie fucking sucked donkey balls.
Yes, I have the intelligence, tact, and wit to produce a detailed expression of how and why, but I wont.
This movie simply fucking blows on all counts.
Amateur, overwrought, trite, and nonsensical. The only joy I will receive from this movie is my new mission to comment on every single critic's review in order to save others from this shit pit of a movie.
The DVD case probably couldn't even absorb enough moisture to be useful as a coaster.
To Anonymous:
I don't see why that line seems so wrong to you. The first line, was just him trying to say something, it shows how he is socially awkward, and she says "you're incredible" in a sort of sarcastic way (as I interpretted it), that shows how she both feels that she is better than that, but also is sort of intrigued by his clumsiness…
"It's just a random scene after random scene", that's what you would say if you don't get anything that's happening. I'd question the sanity too of a person who lacks so much understanding.
The homeless woman would have made sense if the other scenes involving her weren't cut out… You should check the deleted scenes. But either way, have you never stopped up because you've seen something familiar? And exactly that resulted in you meeting someone, or notice something that you else wouldn't have noticed at all?
I'm convinced this reviewer has watched the same Mr Nobody as me, due to their analytical skills I'm not entirely sure they've watched many films at all. There is so much I could write to disagree with what was said, and not just my polar opposite opinions but just plain and simple facts about the film that are wrong in this article.
But I wont, I'll only wind myself up.
I reached this article through the metacritic rating on IMDB, it was the lowest by far, seriously damaging the average which might discourage some viewers from watching the film. The thought of somebody being discouraged from watching a masterpiece due to one persons il-conceived opinions sickens me.
One thing I will touch up on though which you have listed as one of your many perceived flaws of this almost perfect film, is Nemo's quasi immortality: In Nemo's 'Elise dies in a car crash' life we quite clearly see him, a scientist, working on his telemorization theory through his studies of decay and cell reproduction. Nemo discovers quasi immortality, that is also the reason why he is the last mortal.
Finally I would like to request that you, 'KEVIN JAGERNAUTH' cease from writing any further film reviews and certainly from making any visible on metacritic. You are a damaging and disruptive influence to an art-form that deserves a lot more.
Mr. Nobody is my favorite movie. It is absolutely incredible and unparalleled for its depiction of our choices in life, the different paths we may take, their consequences, and different lives we may end up living. The illustration of a decision affecting whether you end up with an unhappy marriage or the love of your life, and that both are possible and real, is communicated beautifully and captivatingly. Its analysis of the hows and whys are thought-provoking in the least. Its art and direction are unusual, but interesting and symbolic.
Eric, I think you should watch this movie again because it seems you did not understand it.