Movie: A Man Called Otto (2022) Caution Spoiler Alert

 A Man Called Otto

Came out; 2022

Time; 2 hours 6 minutes

Watched: Netflix

Rating; R for strong/bloody violence throughout and language

IMDB Rating; 7.5/10

Caution; Spoiler Alert

Staring;

Tom Hanks as Otto

Mariana Trevino as Marisol

Rachel Keller as Sonya

Mack Bayda as Malcom

Cameron Britton as Jimmy

Story Line;

Otto Anderson is a grump who no longer sees purpose in his life following the loss of his wife. Otto is ready to end it all, but his plans are interrupted when a lively young family moves in next door, and he meets his match in quick-witted Marisol. She challenges him to see life differently, leading to an unlikely friendship that turns his world around. A heartwarming and funny story about love, loss, and life, A Man Called Otto shows that family can sometimes be found in the most unexpected places.

Thoughts:

This movie was sad, but not in the sad type of way. This movie was actually really really good and very well written.

It's a very heartwarming story that hits you deep

CAUTION; Major Spoiler Alert

Otto Anderson, a 63-year-old widower, lives in suburban Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. After retiring from a steel company, he plans suicide, having lost his wife Sonya, a schoolteacher, six months previously. During a suicide attempt by hanging, he is interrupted by his new neighbors: Marisol, Tommy, and their two daughters, Abby and Luna. Otto has flashbacks to his past; years previously he tried to enlist in the army but was rejected due to his hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. He meets Sonya on a train after returning a book she dropped. Otto attempts suicide again, this time via carbon monoxide poisoning. He experiences a flashback to a dinner with Sonya, confessing to her that he is not enlisted in the army due to his heart condition and does not have a job, prompting Sonya to kiss him. Marisol disrupts Otto's suicide attempt, asking him to take her and her kids to the hospital after Tommy fell and broke his leg using a ladder Otto had lent to him. Otto reluctantly agrees. Otto has a flashback to his graduation when he asked Sonya to marry him. During a suicide attempt by train, an old man faints and falls on the railroad tracks. Otto saves the man and the incident goes viral. Otto takes Marisol for a driving lesson and they visit Sonya's favorite bakery, which the couple formerly frequented every weekend. There, he tells her about his friendship with a man named Reuben, the two having worked together to establish rules and order, with Otto as chairman of the neighborhood association board. The two grew apart after Reuben's preference for Fords and Toyotas over Otto's Chevrolets and the "coup" of replacing Otto as chairman. Reuben, who had a stroke, now uses a wheelchair and is cared for by his wife Anita and neighbor Jimmy.A local transgender teen, Malcolm, recognizes Otto as Sonya's husband while delivering newspapers and circulars in the neighborhood. Malcolm cuts through Otto's disgruntlement at receipt of the newspapers and recounts that Sonya was his teacher, and one of the few people who accepted him as he was. A friendship forms between the pair and Otto fixes Malcolm's bicycle. After dodging a social media journalist named Shari Kenzie who is attempting to interview him in relation to the earlier viral video, Otto gets angry at both Marisol and a Dye & Merika real estate agent, not wanting to come to terms with Sonya's death. He attempts to commit suicide by shotgun, but is interrupted by Malcolm, who asks to spend the night after his father kicked him out.Otto learns that Dye & Merika is planning to force Reuben into a nursing home and take their house, after illegally finding out that Anita was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. Otto agrees to help Anita and Reuben. Marisol refuses to assist Otto until he tells her that he and Sonya went to Niagara Falls to celebrate Sonya's pregnancy. On the bus back home, they were involved in a crash, and Sonya became paralyzed and had a miscarriage. The neighborhood was not accessible to Sonya and Otto was voted out of the chairmanship after a heated confrontation with a Dye & Merika representative. Otto wanted to put all of the real estate companies out of business but decided against it to care for Sonya. With the help of the neighborhood and Shari Kenzie, Reuben and Anita are able to keep their home.Otto collapses and is taken to the hospital, where he lists Marisol as his next of kin. After being told by a cardiologist that Otto's heart is too big, she laughs, before going into labor and gives birth to a son.One day, Tommy notices that Otto did not shovel the snow on his walkway. Marisol and Tommy enter Otto's house to find him dead, having succumbed to his enlarged heart. A funeral is held, attended by his neighbors. In a letter to Marisol, Otto says that his lawyer will give her his bank accounts, providing them with enough money to take care of her family, along with his new car and house.