Nobel Son

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Nobel Son

R

Released Dec 5, 2008

1h 50m

Mystery & Thriller

Comedy

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Tomatometer

Popcornmeter

25%

Tomatometer

63 Reviews

44%

Popcornmeter

2,500+ Ratings

Soon after his insufferably arrogant father (Alan Rickman) wins the Nobel Prize for chemistry, Barkley Michaelson (Bryan Greenberg) is kidnapped by Thaddeus James (Shawn Hatosy), a young genius who claims to be Barkley's illegitimate half-brother. Motivated not so much by money as revenge, Thaddeus tries to convince Barkley to help him carry out a multimillion-dollar extortion plot against their patriarch.

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Critics Consensus

Despite the best efforts of a strong cast, Nobel Son is over-plotted and self-consciously odd.

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Nick Schager

Slant Magazine

An absolutely abysmal crime flick.

Rated: .5/4

Dec 5, 2008

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J. R. Jones

Chicago Reader

The plot twists are mostly predicated on the characters' improbably shifting loyalties, the sort of thing you can get away with only when the people in your movie are drained of all compassion.

Dec 5, 2008

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Tom Long

Detroit News

It's one of those films stuffed with odd characters in overblown situations. Unfortunately, you don't care about any of them.

Rated: C-

Dec 5, 2008

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Mike Massie

Gone With The Twins

With its constant genre-morphing subplots, psychotic characters, and unordered narrative, it will keep audiences guessing all the way through.

Rated: 6/10

Nov 28, 2020

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Kevin Carr

7M Pictures

The writing is hopelessly obtuse, and it seems that the writer was just trying to pull a fast one on the audience.

Rated: 1.5/5

Jan 11, 2010

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William Goss

Cinematical

Smug and glib and generally apathetic as to who gets what in the end, so long as it seems clever at the time.

Dec 17, 2009

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Mariana H

Good entertaining movie. A bit hard to follow near the end, but overall worth a watch.

Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars

06/23/24

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Cristian s

Básicamente la película es un exceso de giros argumentales. Cumple porque nunca se sabe que va a pasar a continuación pero por momentos esos giros son tan absurdos y confusos que terminan arruinando una buena idea muy mal aplicada.

Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars

09/20/23

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steve d

The cast (and I LOVE the cast) can not make this dark, boring and deeply unpleasant film work.

Rated 2 out of 5 stars

03/30/23

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Audience Member

Reasonable film but a bit too confusing and complicated for me.

Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars

02/25/23

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Audience Member

Only giving it a star because of Greenburg's performance. It's nothing spectacular, but holds up, despite this being a horrible film. Rickman did okay, but I feel like he only worked on this movie to pay for his retirement or something. This movie tries to be suspenseful, funny, serious, and...God, I don't even know what else. But, it tries to be so many things that it made it confusing for me whether to laugh at something or stare blankly. I remember the first minute or so being suspenseful and giving me the impression that this was going to be an awesome cop and robber movie. But, no, we get a confusing plot, characters, and actors that sounded really bored every time they spoke. I'm not kidding, they sounded really dull and boring. Breaks my heart to see this on Rickman's list of movies he's worked on because this was HORRIBLE.

Rated 1 out of 5 stars

01/29/23

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Audience Member

It was certainly different, somewhat hard to follow. Great music from the GREAT Paul Oakenfold. Very interesting plot.

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

02/24/23

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Randall Miller

Director

Alan Rickman

Eli Michaelson

Bryan Greenberg

Barkley Michaelson

Shawn Hatosy

Thaddeus James

Mary Steenburgen

Sarah Michaelson

Eliza Dushku

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Synopsis

Soon after his insufferably arrogant father (Alan Rickman) wins the Nobel Prize for chemistry, Barkley Michaelson (Bryan Greenberg) is kidnapped by Thaddeus James (Shawn Hatosy), a young genius who claims to be Barkley's illegitimate half-brother. Motivated not so much by money as revenge, Thaddeus tries to convince Barkley to help him carry out a multimillion-dollar extortion plot against their patriarch.

Director: Randall Miller
Producer: Randall Miller, Jody Savin
Screenwriter: Jody Savin, Randall Miller
Distributor: Freestyle Releasing
Production Co: Unclaimed Freight
Rating: R (Violent Images|Sexuality|Language)
Genre: Mystery & Thriller, Comedy
Original Language: English
Release Date (Theaters): Dec 5, 2008, Wide
Release Date (Streaming): Sep 18, 2012
Box Office (Gross USA): $333.9K
Runtime: 1h 50m

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