Mr. Nobody (2009)
When the Big Bang occurred, the Universe was thrown into propulsion into space. We are still in the process being propelled in space in an entity that we call time. There could come a time when the energy of the Big Bang would run dry. What happens next? Is time going to recoil and time would move backward? Are all things done in life going to be undone? Is the smoke going return the amber? Is the water droplet going to go back to the jar? This moment of contraction is named ’The Crunch’. There is also the concept of an alternative universe after the Big Bang where only some people would appreciate. Then there is a concept of entropy. Things in the world are destined for gradual destruction. It this how the world ends?
This film depicts alternative paths that our lives would have taken if we had made different choices in life. The story is somewhat along the lines of ’Sliding Doors’ and the Polish film “Blind Chance’. The plots are more complicated, though. Whichever path one takes, it is not going to be a walk in the park, sorrow and hardship may wait at every turn.
The protagonist, Nemo (Nobody in Latin, like in Jules Verne’s ’20,000 leagues under the sea’), has the uncanny ability to predict the future. Just like in the Greek mythology where they believe that we know everything before we are born but is unlearnt before we are sent to Earth, in Nemo’s case, the Angel of Oblivion missed him.
He is born to a loving couple, but the relationship breaks down when Nemo is nine, and he has to make the unenviable decision to decide with whom he wants to stay. The recurrent scene of the boy running after the moving train or to stay with his father is crucial to the story.
The story is told in many time spaces as it weaves to and fro between the future and the past. The actual narration starts as Nemo, an 118-year-old man who is sitting on his death bed in the year 2092. In this time frame, Earth is a sex-less society where immortality is the order of the day through stem-cell technology. Travel to Mars and golfing on the Moon is a breeze. Nemo is the last of the mortals. Though the interview with a reporter of a confused geriatric patient and hypnosis by a doctor, we, the viewers come to understand the various possible outcomes of his life as he narrates his story. Even though disjointed, we get the whole picture at the end.
We see many versions of his life outcome. What if he had stayed with his father? What is he had stayed with his mother? What if he had married either of the girls in his childhood? All the various combinations all lead to different outcomes, but some are more depressing than others. The story also shows the butterfly effect on many of the outcome of things - how a single action of steam from a hot egg could condense to form a water droplet that could smudge to the ink of an important phone number to change Nemo’s fate.
An interesting concept to stimulate the mind. Time as we know it is an illusion. Philosophers may have argued about this since Antiquity. If God created the Universe, there must be a point in time when He created it. So the Universe was not there forever, and it has a beginning, there must be an end. Some Islamic scholars proposed that time has two components, spatial and temporal! Then there is the argument that time moves cyclically; events tend to recur just like how history repeats itself!
Memorable line,
“At my age (118), candles cost more than the cake!”
When the Big Bang occurred, the Universe was thrown into propulsion into space. We are still in the process being propelled in space in an entity that we call time. There could come a time when the energy of the Big Bang would run dry. What happens next? Is time going to recoil and time would move backward? Are all things done in life going to be undone? Is the smoke going return the amber? Is the water droplet going to go back to the jar? This moment of contraction is named ’The Crunch’. There is also the concept of an alternative universe after the Big Bang where only some people would appreciate. Then there is a concept of entropy. Things in the world are destined for gradual destruction. It this how the world ends?
This film depicts alternative paths that our lives would have taken if we had made different choices in life. The story is somewhat along the lines of ’Sliding Doors’ and the Polish film “Blind Chance’. The plots are more complicated, though. Whichever path one takes, it is not going to be a walk in the park, sorrow and hardship may wait at every turn.
The protagonist, Nemo (Nobody in Latin, like in Jules Verne’s ’20,000 leagues under the sea’), has the uncanny ability to predict the future. Just like in the Greek mythology where they believe that we know everything before we are born but is unlearnt before we are sent to Earth, in Nemo’s case, the Angel of Oblivion missed him.
He is born to a loving couple, but the relationship breaks down when Nemo is nine, and he has to make the unenviable decision to decide with whom he wants to stay. The recurrent scene of the boy running after the moving train or to stay with his father is crucial to the story.
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| Life choices |
We see many versions of his life outcome. What if he had stayed with his father? What is he had stayed with his mother? What if he had married either of the girls in his childhood? All the various combinations all lead to different outcomes, but some are more depressing than others. The story also shows the butterfly effect on many of the outcome of things - how a single action of steam from a hot egg could condense to form a water droplet that could smudge to the ink of an important phone number to change Nemo’s fate.
An interesting concept to stimulate the mind. Time as we know it is an illusion. Philosophers may have argued about this since Antiquity. If God created the Universe, there must be a point in time when He created it. So the Universe was not there forever, and it has a beginning, there must be an end. Some Islamic scholars proposed that time has two components, spatial and temporal! Then there is the argument that time moves cyclically; events tend to recur just like how history repeats itself!
Memorable line,
“At my age (118), candles cost more than the cake!”
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