Mr. Nobody

Recently I sat down and watched the 2009 film, "Mr. Nobody".  It premiered at the Venice Film Festival back in 2009.  The film is about Nemo Nobody, who is the last truly mortal man left on planet Earth, at age 118.  The rest of our race has acheived semi-immortality, being able to live significantly longer than naturally possible.  Nemo is about to die, but is joined by a journalist who has been tasked with documenting Nemo's life, as the last true mortal.  He describes his parent's divorce, three possible love interests, and other trying moments in his life.  Theses aspects are told at ages nine, fifteen and thirty-four.  What makes this story different is that Nemo doesn't stick to one story.  These alternate timelines are switched around incredibly quickly, as Nemo makes split second decisions.  This makes the film very non-linear as we bounce between nine possible realities.

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This film also takes a look at different science fiction concepts.  Often times this non-linear format even gives way to the butterfly effect.  We see Nemo affected three times, in multiple realities based on the butterfly effect.  We see a drop of water, leaf in the road and a bird in the road change Nemo's life drastically.  In addition to the butterfly effect, we also see a lot of talk of "The Big Crunch".  The Big Crunch can most readily be described as the opposite of the big bang.  At the end of the universe, everything will contract rapidly.  We see this science play a significant role because Nemo is a science television host in one universe.  

Overall this film features incredibly beautiful shots (and not just because our lead actor, Jared Leto, has gorgeous eyes).  We see many close ups, that help add to the sense of disorientation and fast pace, as we never are given much time to establish a scene.  The attention to detail is immense when it comes to the cinematography.  We also see countless beautiful time lapse shots that create an incredibly surrealist feel.  All of this is complimented by some very intense production design.  Very often, Nemo's worlds are surrealist but uniform.  

This includes a world where everyone wears plaid and drives red cars.  This pattern required a lot of work by the entire production design team.  Overall this film is a beautiful surreal piece, all tied together by the realization from Nemo that, "Each of these lives is the right one! Every path is the right path. Everything could have been anything else and it would have just as much meaning." 

Psychological Thriller: "Donnie Darko" v. "The Butterfly Effect"

Recently I watched the films “Donnie Darko” by Richard Kelly and “The Butterfly Effect” by Eric Bress and J. Mackye Gruber back to back.  Both of these films are categorized as psychological thrillers and both films have many similarities in their plots. Both films played with the time space continuum, both films had characters who have supernatural experiences/powers, and both films featured a troubled protagonist you follow through it all.  Despite these films similarities at the end I found that I disliked “Donnie Darko” but loved “The Butterfly Effect,” and I had to ask myself, “Why?”

            “Donnie Darko” is the story of a teenager named Donnie Darko who hallucinates and sees a demonic bunny named Frank.  The bunny will put Donnie in a trancelike state and Donnie will do his bidding.  One day Frank makes Donnie sleepwalk out of his house, saving his life as a jet turbine that falls from the sky and crashes into his room.  As the story goes on Donnie feels like he owes the bunny for saving his life and his hallucinations get progressively worse until he feels as though he has discovered time travel.  In the end Donnie uses his “new found knowledge” to alter the past (I don’t want to ruin the ending so I wont get too specific).   However at the end of the movie I felt disappointed and almost annoyed.

As I mulled the movie over in my head I began to realize why I found the story so disinteresting.  When the plot is broken down the entire film is based off a hallucination bunny saving Donnie from a mysterious airplane turbine.  Although the airplane turbine was eventually explained it was still too far fetched of a conclusion to be satisfying. I feel that although it was well filmed, directed, edited and shot but the fact of the matter was the plot was not cohesive or believable enough for me.  I feel as though if the central event of the film was more realistic then I would have been able to get more into the movie. 

Inversely, this idea that the script and plot are central to the film is a main reason why I enjoyed “The Butterfly Effect” so much.  Although the central plot point of this film is about a young man named Evan Treborn has a supernatural power to travel into his past it was so well set up and well developed that this seemingly far fetched idea became believable. The teleportation of Evan back in time in order to save his future and the futures of those he loved was beautifully executed.   The ability of the film to catch the audience up to the “new present,” transforming years into only seconds was amazing. However what really impressed me was the preservation of cause and effect in the film and the realism of the outcomes, or new futures, that were created though Evan’s travels into the past.  The writer/filmmakers also had an understanding of their audience.  This is apparent when the filmmakers play into everyone’s worst fear that the protagonist Evan is in fact insane and that he has been imagining his flashbacks the whole thing.

I feel as though these movies stand as prime examples for what good writing can do as well as the determents of having an unbelievable storyline.  In the genre of “psychological thriller” the plot is imperative to the success of the film in the eyes of the viewer.  In my opinion if things do not come full circle and there is no clear/or realistic revolution, especially for this genre of film, the film will not satisfy the viewer.  It goes to show that, for the most part, even if you shoot a beautiful film if the script/storyline are not compelling or believable then in the end the audience will not be satisfied.