Movie Notes: Inception
= 5 stars
Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Ellen Page, Joseph Gordon Levitt
Directed by Christopher Nolan
Synopsis
Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) extracts secrets from unknowing individuals by invading their dreams.
The Good
- Much suspense relies in comprehension of this worlds rules, which are efficiently explained through smart writing and direction as the plot barrels along, including the tragic story of Cobb’s deceased wife, Mal.
- Showy effects have reason: slow motion represents a different rate of time in a dream surrounding a dream, gravity shifts within a dream occur due to things actually happening to the dreamer, and computer graphics compose some surreal moments within dreams. But overall, the film style is gritty and thriller-real, which helps “sell” the entire world — we’re usually unaware that we’re dreaming, even when strange things happen.
- Compelling mix of personal favorites: the nutty mind games of Being John Malkovich, dark film noir with a dangerous dame (Cobb’s wife’s name is pronounced “moll”), Solaris, Ocean’s Eleven, and Until the End of the World.
- Actors I’ve enjoyed elsewhere: DiCaprio is reliably solid (although typecast as perpetually frowning and pissed off), Ellen Page (Juno), Joseph Gordon Levitt adds tough guy to his repertoire (500 Days Of Summer, Brick), and Marion Cotillard (La Vie En Rose) whom I’ve followed since the darkly comic Love Me If You Dare.
- Ambiguous yet satisfying ending: I don’t want to know if the final scene was a dream or not, any more than if Deckard was an android.
- One mark of a classic film is distinctive elements ripe for parody — bouncing off ceilings while waking up from dreams within dreams set to the oppressive Hans Zimmer score could be this year’s “I drink your milkshake.”
The Bad
- These dreams are oddly based in relentless, James Bond action, with a little much adherence to reality — no gigantic coconuts sodomizing a flying Will Ferrell, or reappearing in high-school with no pants.
- Like Being John Malkovich, one must buy into this fictional reality to be swept away by what follows. If you’re not sold on the concepts early on, all else collapses.
Conclusion
Through Inception, Nolan proves a most effective architect, creating an immersive, entertaining world that as an audience, we enter without knowing what came before or after, and at times it became a temporary reality — like a dream. In a world without dream-sharing technology, the closest we come are movies, and this was a particularly entertaining one.
IMDB: Inception
Wikipedia: Inception
Rotten Tomatoes: Inception 87%
Deckard WAS a replicant and this movie rocked! My theory is that it was all a dream — but not Cobb’s though — it was his Father-in-Law’s dream and that’s why the children hadn’t aged and we saw things that occurred even when Dom wasn’t around.
Like you, I think the very fact that so many people are eager to pick this movie apart is indicative of it’s reach and caliber.
I loved Joseph Gordon Levitt in “Brick” and he certainly didn’t let me down with this film.
What was kinda trippy was watching DiCaprio’s recent (and very good) “Shutter Island” just a few days prior to “Inception.” Not so much the styles, but some of the dominant themes of the two movies have, I think, some strong commonalities. (I’d be interested in hearing if you thought the parallels were as remarkable as I did.) He is at risk of becoming typecast in a Christian Bale sorta way — but maybe his next project, a biopic of J. Edgar Hoover (directed by Clint Eastwood!!), will shake things up a bit.
hey that theory about his dad running the show is a good one. And I guess from that, maybe Ariadne was helping out in getting Cobb to forget his wife, after all she was his dad’s student to begin with.
I’m personally interpreting the ending as Cobb not caring if he’s awake or dreaming, so long as he’s with his kids. He leaves the table and doesn’t even bother to see if the top falls or not. It’s only us as the audience who might get hung up on the reality / dream.
Anyhow, I shall definitely add Shutter Island to my queue; that’s another movie I have little knowledge of and it should be good going into it cold — as I did Inception!
Top falls: Mr. Saito shoots Cobb, and himself, to help remind him of what’s true “reality” — he even says that he’s there “to honor their arrangement.” Mr. Saito is the extractor at this point — though perhaps only a subconscious projection. He’s there to help Cobb dig out from this level of limbo and the overall emotional trap of the subconscious world he built with his wife. The team on the plane reacts to Cobb waking up with smiles and Mr. Saito makes the call to Cobb’s dad that they were successful.
Top doesn’t fall: If Mr. Saito shoots Cobb dead so that he remains in limbo, and the extraction team (real or otherwise) fails with their inception, then what he’s experiencing is a dream of his choice where he returns to his kids.
The latter argument was something my wife and I debated because I had to know what was happening with Cobb in the *real* world as a result. If he were on the plane — or at home, for that matter — then he’s got some time before he dies in real life to spend with his kids in dream-time? Or, does just he eventually wake up a few hours later and this is ALL a dream. Bummer, whatever that would mean.
Either way, he’s got kids (or dreams he does) that he pines for but whether or not he’s too deep at this point to come out all the way is the question left to us to answer.
BTW, I saw HUGE parallels with Shutter Island.
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