Nobody - The Perfect Antidote To Modern Action Films

one of the great things about the world today is strip clubs that even the average man has access to some of the finest food the world has ever produced if you've got the money or you're willing to hold the restaurant staff at gunpoint you can indulge yourself with beluga caviar filet mignon seared lobster and vintage champagne and don't get me wrong that's great and everything but sometimes what you really want is a big greasy cheeseburger with a couple of pints of cold beer in other words simple unpretentious food done well and really i can't think of a better metaphor to describe nobody an action thriller about a retired cia operative who gets drawn back into his old life when he unintentionally provokes the anger of a russian mobster and if this all reminds you of a certain other movie that begins with jon and ends with wick then rest assured that you're not the only one but don't worry we'll talk more about that later first of all let's talk about the plot well it shouldn't take long believe me the film centers around hutch mancell a seemingly average guy living a decidedly average life well apart from the fact he's married to connie [ __ ] neilson seriously you're punching above your weight there my friends anyway the opening scenes quickly established the tedious grind of hutch's daily life he's a quiet unassuming kind of guy who takes the bus to work each day he's stuck in a dead-end job his co-workers don't respect him and even his kids aren't interested in him he's the sort of man that you pass on the street a hundred times a day and don't even notice but things change for him one night when armed robbers break into his home rather than fight to defend his family he instead recognizes them for the frightened desperate criminals they are and lets them escape unchallenged well until he finds out that they took his daughter's bracelet and then things take a very different turn give me the god damn kitty cat bracelet [ __ ] see it turns out that hutch was once a cia assassin who left his old life behind to settle down and start a family and ever since he's been struggling to repress the darker side of his nature but when a bunch of drunken thugs forced their way onto the bus that he's riding home that part of him finally finds an outlets you know i couldn't help but compare the scene to the bloodless bruiseless disneyfied fight scene in shanghai where people can take half a dozen punches to the face without so much as messing up their hair this one is a brutal violent bloody slugging match with both sides taken and given heavy punishment there's real weight and damage behind every punch and kick and i love how hot she even comes back for more after getting thrown out of a [ __ ] window reminds me of that time i got refused service in that pub in dundee but they learned their lesson dear viewer believe that anyway it turns out that one of the [ __ ] on the receiving end of hachi's forceful personality adjustment was the brother of a russian crime lords what are the odds say naturally he wants some payback so he sends the crew around to hatchi's house to administer some personality adjustment of his own and well you can pretty much imagine how that turns out so the movie basically escalates into a full-scale war between the two men culminating in a final explosive shootout at the metal fabrication plant where hatch works there's improvised booby traps slow motion shootouts and a 200 year old christopher [ __ ] lloyd work in a pump action shotgun like an absolute boss what more can you ask for i said before there's a lot to be said for simple concepts well executed and i think that nobody is a perfect example of this the plot's as basic as they come in movies like this a retired assassin forced back into his old life to settle a score with an evil crime lords it's simple and streamlined and the movie doesn't waste a single second trying to embellish something that fundamentally doesn't need it the opening segment gives us enough of an insight into the main characters that we know exactly where they're at in life hutch and his wife are your classic bored middle-aged couple growing down by the monotony of daily life and growing increasingly distant from each other it's the same basic premise as harry and his wife from true lies and it makes the same point that perhaps we all need a bit of adventure and danger from time to time to stop us becoming dull and complacent it's a decent tried and true premise to give a bit of depth to our characters but the movie never lingers on it for too long and i love the fact that when hutch tells his wife to take herself and the kids someplace safe she actually [ __ ] listens to him for once in the hands of a different writer the movie would have gotten bogged down in the relationship fallout of him lying about his background or even had his family get taken hostage for the climax but instead the movie's just like nah it'll be fine and as a result i'm fine with it too as i mentioned earlier it's not hard to spot the echoes of john wick in this film both feature conflicted men with dark pasts pulled back into the life they tried to leave behind in order to wage a one-man war against an evil russian crime lord determined to kill them jesus they were even written and produced by the same men i mean if it ain't broke don't fix it i guess the difference though is in the detail of the two characters whereas john wick was very clearly a man you wouldn't want to [ __ ] with even before he goes back into his old life hutch genuinely looks like an average joe who wouldn't hurt a fly and i'll have to give props to the casting department on this one bob odenkirk is probably the last guy on earth you'd picture as a kick-ass assassin but somehow he manages to switch from mild-mannered family man to brutal killer in the blink of an eye and make it seem like the most natural transition in the worlds i also love how he actually takes a real beating throughout the movie whereas john wick basically plows his way through dozens of armed opponents without breaking a sweat hutch really gets [ __ ] up along the way he gets stabbed punched beaten thrown through windows and shot and somehow he just keeps going whereas wick is cool well-dressed and menacing hutch looks like he buys his clothes from the discount island target all of these different elements come together to create a character that feels grounded and believable with just enough complexity to draw you in and get you invested before kicking it into nofox given action modes it's simple but undeniably effective ultimately nobody is a refreshingly simple fun unpretentious action film with enough violence and set pieces to keep me thoroughly entertained for its 90 minute run time it never takes itself too seriously it doesn't dwell too long on the implications of its main events and like any good action flick the ending leaves open the possibility of a sequel something i'd absolutely be up for and really it feels like the perfect antidote to the sanitized neutered overblown cgi [ __ ] fests masquerading as action movies today it certainly isn't high brow stuff and i can't say it breaks any new ground in the action thriller genre but to be honest i don't [ __ ] need it to every new movie doesn't need to reinvent the wheel and produce some revolutionary new viewing experience sometimes in life it really is okay to just kick back with a burger and a beer anyway that's all i've got for today go away now

Channel: The Critical Drinker

Views: 1,996,129

Keywords: review, bob odenkirk, connie nielsen, thriller, action hero, john wick

Id: BireP8dKHVU

Length: 7min 7sec (427 seconds)

Published: Tue Sep 28 2021