Review: Nobody (2021)
Sometimes the best part about watching a new movie with actors you’re familiar with is getting the opportunity to have your preconceived notions of an actor completely smashed or having your built in expectations of a story totally stripped down, reworked, and put back together in an even more heightened way than before. Try as we may, more times than not, finding a film that is able to do all of that and deliver on entertainment is rare. However, I was able to catch lightning in a bottle when I picked up a copy of Nobody, released this year (2021) and billed as an Action/Thriller starring Bob Odenkirk and Connie Nielsen.
The story follows Hutch Mansell (Odenkirk), a man whom, on the surface, comes across as your typical 9-5, five days a week, suburban dad who is anything but exciting to his older son and has a particularly distant and cold-like feeling of a relationship with his wife, played by Nielsen. The opening montage to the movie really gives you a sense of how rooted into suburban monotony this man has become until one night, intruders break into his home for a quick score of sellable middle class items. Hutch actually gets the drop on one of the two assailants, but refuses to do anything, which, in the moment, it’s framed as if he froze out of fear, but soon we realize that our run-of-the-mill working class dad isn’t what he seems to be.
Official Trailer of Nobody
As the story unfolds, typical “bad ass” tropes we’ve seen before from films like the John Wick franchise or The Accountant starring Ben Affleck start to unravel the backstory of our protagonist. What makes me appreciate this story more so than it’s predecessors is how it focuses on Hutch’s emotional awakening from within as to how much he didn’t realize he needed the “chaos” of his former life to feel more alive as an individual. In life, when we make the decision to take a simpler path after spending so much time on the bumpier paths prior, we appreciate the newness and the calmness of the path of least resistance, but there’s always that devil sitting on the other shoulder...the proverbial itch just below the surface that somehow can’t be scratched by typical day to day life. Within this film,
you see that monster lurking in Hutch’s shadows and he desperately wants to come out and play.
After the intruders break into his house and they get away unscathed, our hero finds it harder and harder to keep the monster chained up. And you know what? We find out, he’s ok with that. He wants to let that monster loose, and we as the audience get to see the effects of what happens when he goes down that path.
From then on, the story keeps building as more layers of his character’s past are exposed and we start to get the full picture of who this man was and more importantly, who this man is now. The action is quite good and does fall in the same vein as John Wick with regard to its car chases, gun play, and overall choreography. To say that Odenkirk really worked his ass off for this role would be an understatement. Which brings me back to my point about expectations. Bob Odenkirk started his career in comedy and found big time success along side David Cross on the hit show Mr. Show. Parlaying that success into acting, eventually Bob would get the gig of a lifetime on the insanely popular TV show, Breaking Bad (which is a favorite here at Dude, What?!), playing sleazy lawyer, Saul Goodman.
Better Call Saul ©2015 AMC
The crazy success of Breaking Bad not only shined a spotlight onto Bob’s great acting chops, but it eventually lead him to his second gig of a lifetime, reprising his character from Breaking Bad in origin story fashion on Better Call Saul. Some argue that Better Call Saul is giving Breaking Bad a run for its money as to which story is best, and its all attributed to the fantastic acting and storytelling of Bob Odenkirk. One thing an actor doesn’t want to do in their career is fall victim to typecast and Bob was able to avoid that when he transitioned from comedy to acting and now he’s shattered all sense of expectation by taking on a gritty action role as he did in Nobody and it works.
It absolutely works.
And the reason it works so damn good is because Bob committed whole heartedly and made the role his (Just watch the bonus features on the DVD to get a glimpse of the work Bob put into this role). When an actor can destroy preconceived notions and ideas that have been placed upon them, you know you’re starting to see the rise of a big time player and as a fan, I couldn’t be happier to see his stock rise.
Nobody ©2021 Universal Pictures
As the story plays out, we get contributions from Christopher Lloyd and RZA, who in his own right, has turned out to be a pretty damn good actor himself. To say that the story is predictable would make it seem like it’s a negative when in actuality, the predictability doesn’t hinder the entertainment value at all. There’s enough spontaneity within the execution of the script that helps you overlook the predictability of the overall story and you literally just go along for the thrill ride.
You find yourself wanting to know how the story is going to unfold and that’s the mark of a fun movie.
Nobody easily erased any senses of expectation I may have carried going into the film with its performance by Bob Odenkirk and I hope to see him take more roles like this down the road. He has shown me with this film that, as an actor, he can handle any role offered him and his performance will be delightfully entertaining.
Brian J. Sumner is the Host of Dude, What?!, author of The Secrets of Dr. Killiecrankie and really Nobody special . . . Or is he?
