If you have not seen this film and don’t want a spoiler, don’t read further! This film follows the thoughts of a man named Nemo Nobody. The thoughts all throughout the movie take place in an instant in his time as he is debating what decision to make inside of his own mind. His parents separate when he is just nine years old and he is forced to choose which parent he will go with; he can only choose one. Every scenario possible in the future rushes through his mind based on what decision is made. The characters in the movie follow their own life. The characters hint that they can tell the future. In the end, the character of one-hundred-eighteen-year-old Nemo is sitting in his hospital bed getting ready to die, he tells his visitor that neither himself or the visitor even exists. That character asks him what he means. Nemo then explains that everything they experience in their reality is just nine-year-old Nemo’s imagination.
This movie asks us multiple philosophical questions such as, “Is our reality true?”, “Are we able to predict our future based on the knowledge we already know?”, and “Who and what is the thing that decides our destiny?” Nemo is the narrator, and as he goes throughout all of these scenarios, he takes belief in the butterfly effect. The butterfly effect claims that when one thing happens it starts a chain reaction of events. Even small things such as a leaf landing on the ground at the right time could change someone’s life forever (as displayed in the movie). He makes up these scenarios up based on the events that have happened in the past and the events that could possibly transpire in the future. He is predicting his future.
As the viewer is watching the movie, the thought of, “What is actually our own reality?” probably comes to mind. This question is displayed through the characters claiming that they know their future as if it were predetermined by a higher being, but the characters don’t know who that higher being is. It’s almost as if they know that they aren’t real but they live their lives as they are real because it is the only reality they are familiar with. They do not have enough information to prove that the lives they are living are not real. In the end of the movie, we find out that only the character of Nemo in the scenarios really know that it is all just an imagination, and none of the characters are real. They are only a figment of his imagination.
How do we know that we aren’t just a figment of someone’s imagination? Or our lives are truly our lives? Who is the one who decides how our lives happen? Are we the ones who make decisions, or is there someone or something making decisions for us and making us believe we are in control?
This movie suggests that we have the power to control where our lives go with every decision we make, but it also explains that some events are out of our power because of the actions other make. It also shows that nature has a say in what happens in our lives. This movie is a true display of how our lives are not always completely in control but we have a say in some circumstances; We cannot control everything. Is there always a great power dictating our lives? Or are we in charge of our own destiny? Will we ever know?
