Derek Kolstad

Normal

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Sheriff Richardson with a cup of coffee

After John Wick, Nobody and after Nobody, Normal, all films written by Derek Kolstad and all telling essentially the same story – mess with this seemingly placid dude at your peril. Normal is Bob Odenkirk going around the block one more time with Kolstad – Nobody one and two did good business so why not? But this time Kolstad has Coen brothers ambitions in his broadening out of the landscape and deepening of the characterisation. Though for the most part it is another example of Kolstad as the consummate Hollywood writer – everything has its place and everything has its pace, and a detail dropped in now is surely going to pay off later, … Read more

Nobody

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Bob Odenkirk with cat

“Who the fuck are you?” two cops ask the bloody guy they’ve got sitting over the table from them, in some sort of interview situation. “I’m, er…” he says. And boom, up on the screen comes the single word in giant letters, NOBODY, and this head-clearing mix of extreme violence and dry comedy gets underway. The nobody is feeding a kitten from a tin of tuna, by the way. A movie-length flashback answers the cops’ question. The guy is called Hutch Mansell. Director Ilya Naishuller and writer Derek Kolstad quick-cut-montage a picture of his humdrum existence. A suburban husband and father who does the routine things that dads with two school-age kids do, … Read more