NOBODY

US, 2021, 91 minutes, Colour.
Bob Oden Kirk, Connie Neilson, Christopher Lloyd, Aleksey Serebryakov, Michael Ironside, Colin Salmon, RZA.
Directed by Ilya Nailshuller.

It doesn’t come as a surprise to learn that the writer for this violent, action show is Derek Kolstad, the writer for all the John Wick actioners. The central character, moving towards the end of middle age, is called Hutch Mansell, played by Bob Oden Kirk, best known for television series like Better Call Saul and Breaking Bad, a longtime screen writer with a talent for comedy.

Thinking about John Wick and his violent career, hitman, high body count, one might conclude that this is a version of John Wick Sr, the hitman getting an opportunity to career change, drop the violence completely (well, not exactly completely) and his becoming a husband and father with a regular work routine. In fact, the film begins very well with a quick outline and visuals of each day of Hutch’s week, including missing out on getting the garbage bin out on time for the collector (and wondering why he doesn’t put it out the night before as most of us do), the signalling of the days of the weeks getting faster and faster.

Hutch’s life is routine, but becoming more than a touch frigid in his relationship with his wife, Rebecca (Connie Neilson) a professional woman. His teenage son doesn’t seem to think all that much of him. But he is devoted to his little daughter.

And then, two masked burglars turn up, the son tackling one of them, Hutch restraining himself from smashing a golf club on the female burglar’s head. The son is not impressed.

In the meantime, Hutch has some ambitions to take over his wife’s father’s family business where he works. And he goes to visit his ex-FBI agent father, played with enormous vigour, as we see by the end, by Christopher Lloyd, relishing his role, in a home for the elderly.

Determining that he will assert himself more strongly, especially for his son’s admiration, he tracks down the burglars only to find they had some reasonable cause for the burglary. But, it is on the way home, on a bus, that he encounters a group of reckless young men who have crashed their car, get on the bus, menace the few passengers – and then provoke Hutch. His repressed inner rage breaks out, helped by his military training in the past. He is on the receiving end of a lot of hits and punches himself, but, in bone-crunching way, he wins the night.

We might expect that there are consequences and there are, tangling with the Russian Mafia, a most obnoxious villain who dresses showily, snorts cocaine, sings on stage in his nightclub, supervises millions of dollars of illegal cash – and has henchman galore at his beckoning.

If this sounds interesting and provocative, then Nobody is your show, a lot of action, a lot of ingenuity with weapons, some huge shootouts. A lot of this is done tongue-in-cheek, hyperbole, to say the least. And, continually in the background is a range of popular songs, lyrics apt for the action, including Louis Armstrong and What a Wonderful World as his house burns to the ground, To Dream the Impossible Dream at the height of the shooting, and I’ll Never Walk Alone from Carousel during the climax. Actually, there is a happy ending, of course, with Let the Good Times Roll over the final credits!

Hutch proves that he is not exactly a Nobody even if that is the name in his highly secret government file.

1. The title? Expectations? Hutch’s response to the interrogators? His name in the secret file?

2. The city of Winnipeg, city sequences, in the city, streets, clubs, suburbs, homes? The bus? Car chases? The warehouse? Musical score?

3. The work of the writer, the tradition of John Wick? The silent hero? Background, martial arts skills? The hero in middle age?

4. The tantalising opening, Hutch, the interrogation, feeding the cat, Nobody?

5. The device of the days of the week, Hutch’ rutine, the detail, home, work, the garbage bin…, Speeding up of the days, the weeks, highlighting the routine?

6. Hutch, his work, his brother-in-law and the threats, his father-in-law and wanting to buy the business? Later offering him the gold? The acceptance? His taking over the plant, preparing the weapons, preparing the trap’s? The climax in the warehouse?

7. Hutch and Rebecca, the coldness of the marriage? The son and his critique of his father? The little girl? The burglary, Hutch and his reaction, the son tackling the thief, Hutch and the golf club, not hitting? The escape? The reaction the next morning?

8. Hutch, his past, the years of the marriage, self-correction? Indications of his past? His going to find the burglars, the tattooes, the visit to the salons, the information, the visit to the home, the husband and wife, the ill baby, his letting them go?

9. The bus, the crashed car, the young men and their rowdiness, the girl passenger, the bus driver? Hutch going into action, his skills, yet his being punched and bloodied? Some going to the hospital? His return home? Rebecca’s puzzle?

10. The night club, the Russians, the owner, cocaine, clothes, singing on stage, his types, the revelation of his managing the cash? The black Russian as henchmen? The news of the attack, the visit to his son in hospital? Vengeance? Information, tracking down Hutch? The contact with Washington, the blackmail for the official, his searching out the document, the researcher walking away?

11. The attack on the house, Hutch putting the family in the basement, then getting them to safety? The house burning down? The attack, the shooting, his neighbours flash card, the pursuit, the crashes, beginning to fill his story to the Ethiopian Russian?

12. The Russian, vengeance, the large number of gangsters, the attack?

13. His father, in the home, the FBI background, Hutch taking his badge? His stash of weapons? The photo, the father and the two brothers, the black brother? His calling on them, contact with his brother radio, the coming to the warehouse?

14. Hutch having his meal in the club, the threat of the bomb? The pursuit?

15. The attack on the warehouse, the invasion, the many men, shootings and death, the traps? Hutch’s father, his brother and their involvement? The final confrontation with the Russian, Hutch and his destruction of the warehouse and burning the cash, the fight, the bomb and explosion?

16. The aftermath, the family, the new house, the basement?

17. The use of songs throughout the film, for key events, tone and lyrics? Especially that Hutch not be misunderstood!