Parents' Guide to

Mr. Nobody

By Brian Costello, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 16+

Daring sci-fi with mature themes, sex, and violence.

Movie R 2009 141 minutes
Mr. Nobody Poster Image

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

Community Reviews

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age 16+

Based on 1 parent review

Angi365
Angi365 Adult
July 9, 2019
age 16+

This title has:

Too much sex
See all 1 parent review

What's the Story?

It's the year 2092, and MR. NOBODY (Jared Leto), a man named Nemo in his late 110s, is on his death bed, the last mortal human on the planet. He's an obvious source of worldwide fascination, so an intrepid journalist and a psychiatrist interview Nemo to find out what life was like before the immortality of the human race. Through a series of flashbacks that could be memory, or completely made up, or speculations on what might have been, the movie follows the life of a boy who chose to live with his father instead of his mother when forced to choose between them after their divorce, showing the women he might have married, the children he might have had, the highs and lows of his life, and so on. This is all interspersed with surreal worlds where everyone wears argyle, or a trip to Mars where he honors the request of one of his possible wives to scatter her ashes on the Martian surface, and explanations of string theory, the butterfly effect, entropy, and how these ideas of theoretical physics also impact the seemingly infinite directions one's life could go. Soon it appears that the big bang of the universe in which Nobody is on his deathbed begins to retract in time and space into "the big crunch," returning in time and space to the young boy faced with the most difficult and pivotal decision of his life.

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say (1):
Kids say (4):

At first, this movie feels like it's trying too hard to be unclear; it feels disorienting and unwieldy and lost in a sea of artsy pretension. But then the dizziness turns into a kind of wonder not often experienced in the three-act factory-grade formulaic structures of the predictable Hollywood movie. The confusion is still there, but it lessens, and it's easy to get into the spirit of the thing. Mr. Nobody is a beautiful movie, with allusions to everything from 2001: A Space Odyssey to Solaris to even Harold and Maude, and with reflections on the nature of human memory that echo the very best novels of Vladimir Nabokov, on the themes of labyrinths and infinity explored in the work of Jorge Luis Borges, and a kind of magical realism that's as much Kafka as it is Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

It seems inevitable that a movie such as Mr. Nobody would be a cult favorite, and it's easy to see its stature increasing in the future in a way similar to how the mysteries-wrapped-in-enigmas of Twin Peaks have found so many new admirers since its first appearance. It's the kind of movie that will inspire debate about its different meanings, on the significance of this scene or the symbolism of that object. As well it should. It's a much-needed reminder of what film can be at its most audacious, daring, and challenging.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

  • Families can talk about the themes of Mr. Nobody. What are they, and how were they explored?

  • Most movies follow a very basic three-act structure in which certain themes, conflicts, and plot points are supposed to happen to build the story arc and build to a resolution. How is the structure of this movie different? Was it harder to follow because of its unusual structure?

  • Is this a movie you would watch again, and if so, do you think it would increase your understanding and appreciation of it? What are some examples of movies that get better with repeated viewings?

Movie Details

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