Inception

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If the thumbs are such a gimmick then why are they warrented a 3 page discussion in the Inception thread?
 
Truth is what works, as they say. That's why critical theory is so fun.

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And yes, the moment right before Mal's death is the moment Cobb pick up her totem, thus destroying her only real link to reality. She doesn't necessarily see this, but it is as if, at this point, her reality in "our" world has totally collapsed.

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And I think Nolan will be forever trying to recreate his BECUZ HE KAN TAEK IT ending. Something so overblown that you can actually forget how ridiculous what just happened was. He definitely tried it again with the R U HERE 2 KILL ME? dramatic whispering while scowling.
 
Another great review, Suspect. I too didn't mind Ellen Paige much in the film. She did a bit better than I thought she would, and didn't feel out of place, which is feat given the caliber of actors around her.

Quite surprised to hear that you were initially disappointed that Nolan wasn't doing the third Batman straight away, though. I loved The Dark Knight too, but I would a bit upset had he gone on to do the next one straight away. But yeah, I figured you would like the film and glad that you do. Again, great review kiddo.
 
I posted this in my review thread, but I'll repost it here. As some of you know, I really disliked the film. Here's more as to why it didn't work... at all for me.

Inception (2010, Christopher Nolan)



Dreams aren't exactly a new concept to focus a film around, and Inception is the latest of several "action idea" films to hit the screens. Dreams within dreams within dreams is a cool concept, I'll admit. A few other films that treaded down similar territory as Inception - some more alike, some less include; Total Recall, The Matrix, Dark City, and so on. Movies that deal with dreams and reality that are in less of an action vein include Vanilla Sky, The Science of Sleep, Being John Malkovich, and on and on... Why do I name drop these other films? I do so to point out that Inception is really not groundbreaking at all, and this concept has been floating around in Hollywood for several decades now. I guess I find it a bit perplexing when I read reviews or hear people discuss how groundbreaking and inovative the film is. Not really, audiences have seen this type of thing before and done much better.
The film begins with putting the audience into the action and then progresses into an extended exposition explaining the premise. Leonard DiCaprio is a thief and fugitive who steals information by putting people to sleep and then entering their dreams to extract information. Even more difficult to do is to implement rather than extract information, thus the title of the film. Cillian Murphy, one of my favorite young actors, plays Leo's target for the film for whom our protagonist must dissaude from following in his father's business.
A simple plot really, but the film would like the viewer to think it's more complicated than it really is. Of course Christopher Nolan throws in a backstory about how Leo lost his wife and now she haunts his dreams and his career and so on. This would work if there was any chemistry between the two characters of which there is not. Also there is no effort spent on developing the relationship or scenes spent on showing the two together in love aside from a couple scenes where they say they are in love. Regardless this romantic/haunting love backstory is thrown into the film for two main purposes. Number one is of course marketing and demographic based. Without this sideplot the film would be a difficult sell to females who must tag along with their boyfriends to see the film. The second reason of course is to give Leo's character a movtivation and driving force, but to show he is fallable, which gives the illusion of a three dimension character, when really his character is very thinly drawn.
Juno Hard Candy is also thrown into the film who looks a little too young and child-like for the role of a person responsible for creating a dreamworld. But she's a fresh face who will attract young audiences who would normally go see a Michael Bay film this time of year, so it was for all purposes a smart casting move. As a viewer I found it insulting that her character is let in on everything and understands more after a day or two of working with Leo than his entire crew who has been working with him for years. But that fits within the film rules because Leo's crew are secondary characters, while Juno is a primary character. Also miscast is Joseph Gordon-Levitt who plays an action role, but also looks like a little kid. For this part it calls for someone a bit more gruff.
Up until now my complaints about Inception have mainly been limited to the plot, which by the way the film breaks every rule that it builds up with the last frame. SPOILERS, but either the top will spin or it won't spin. If it spins it is a dream. If it falls it is reality. Well Nolan jerks his audience around by having it wobble and then stand up straight, clearly going for the ambiguous "let's discuss it and try to figure it out" ending. Too bad he can't stick to his own film's rules. I dare anyone who has not seen this film, but will or who will see it a subsequent time to count how many seconds each shot is held. I don't think you will get above five seconds. The camera is constantly moving and the editing is as frentic as a Michael Bay film, with no shot held to enjoy the beauty of the mise en scene. The soundtrack is stock "urgent" music and never lets up. There is very little dialogue in the film outside of exposition, and plot. There is no chemistry between any of the characters, or reason I should care about any of this.
Chris Nolan is a fine filmmaker, but clearly he has been goaded by the suits in Hollywood to make hybrid films that attract both the film snob viewer and the Michael Bay viewer. In that regard Inception is a masterpiece of marketing because it is able to attract and cater to a broad group of viewers. Memento was amazing, but Inception... ehhhh not so much. If I want a "thinking film" I'll watch one, and if I want an action film I'll watch one. I'll even watch Total Recall if I want a brilliant hybrid of the two. I'll watch Inception again if I want a headache.

Grade: D
 
hmm. Mixed feelings. At the beginning absolute confusion, no idea what's going on, thinking jeez this 148 minutes is going to drag mightily. Once Nolan let's you understand what's going on you're at least grateful the story can unfold and take you with it.
The special effects are awesome, the pace manic, the acting good, it's well done no doubt but for me I couldn't understand why the landcapes of the dreams they designed to enter Fischer's mind in order to plant the idea had to be so complicated and on such a huge scale. We ended up in a scenario that was for all the world a James Bond film. I couldn't help thinking that there was a great idea but one which could've worked in a smaller, darker, deeper film not one that played like a computer game.

It didn't drag, in fact the time went quickly, it's a clever film but it didn't satisfy and I wouldn't bother seeing it again. I see it has a 9.3 rating on imdb already which makes it number 83 out of the top 250 films. I think time will sort that one out.
 
I agree, that the safest answer is probably to dismiss everything as occurring in a dream state, so no logic is necessary. But the entire purpose of Nolan's screenplay was to ground the dream world in logic. There are entire scenes of exposition establishing set rules for the subconscious. That's why I think everything that happens is supposed to have a 'logical'-- according to Nolan's invented dream logic-- explanation.

I don't want to accept that everything can be random because it's a dream. There should be consistencies, since Nolan worked so hard at tying these three worlds and limbo together through painstaking editing.

At least answer me this. Do they all awake from the first dream (Yusuf's rainy city) when the timer winds down? Did Cobb and Saito wake up when they (presumably) killed themselves? Or did the timer wake them up? Or they killed themselves, wandered around between worlds, and the timer woke them up. I'm just wondering, because the movie goes to great lengths to set limbo up as this black hole of raw consciousness that grabs hold of people inside like quicksand, and they just get stuck there. After all, that is what happened to Saito.

--Actually I'm remembering something I thought when first watching this. I think Saito didn't even know it was a dream and that's the whole problem! He thought it was real, so he aged; Cobb knew it was limbo, so time was irrelevant to him and he didn't age. When Cobb reminded him, awaking to reality is as simple as killing yourself. Just like Mal and Cobb did on the train tracks. Duh! Maybe?
 
Excellent review and interview, Yoda. I completely agree that the ending was reality too, but to be fair, I can see why some people would say otherwise (the aforementioned childrens clothes, the idea of Inception itself) That's what I love about the ending, though. It's vintage Nolan and although it comes across as open ended, there is a true answer there.

Like Yoda said, the totem never stopped spinning during the dream sequences, it always spun perfectly. Considering that we were taken on a wild journey throughout the film with Cobb, it would have been a bit too harsh not to reward him and us, the audience somehow.

I think that the addition of the wobbling top also calls forth the notion of reality blurred with fantasy, and that reinforces the films theme of 'how do you tell the difference between the two?'

The whole thing being a dream thing does not make any sense at all, for reasons others have stated, the biggest evidence against that being that there were mildly intimate scenes between other characters other than Cobb. Plus what do they have to gain by performing inception on Cobb anyway????
 
Wow, that was a pretty condescending review. True, there were people there did not like the film and I heard a woman muttering to her husband that she didn't "understand it." Maybe there are those few that like to say films like this are great and all that even if they don't "get it."

BUT, really, are you saying that anyone with any intelligence would see right through this and realize what crap it was?

I found it a pretty entertaining ride and a lot of fun. And believe me, I don't fall for many of those films that seem to ride on a trick.. I didn't like Memento, a film most Nolan fans love.

And as to being "original?" There is nothing wrong with someone taking an idea that has been put forth and putting their own spin on it. Jeez, that is what movie making is. There are no TRULY original stories.

As to Leo being in "weird" movies? You know Shutter Island was an homage to Hitchcock, right? Yep, that's weird alright.
 
Any interpretations of the ending ?

[spoilers="inception ending"]I thought the ending to be ambigious for awhile, but it's pretty conclusive that he's dreaming (kids still the same age, doing the same exact thing as they do in his memory).

I've read some intrepretations that the whole movie is actually Cobb performing inception on himself, which seems a little far fetched right now.[/spoilers]
 
i just saw it today. i don't want to discuss it to death yet but i like it a whole lot. it gave me the kind of fits of excited laughter that i got from the incredibles and district 9. not that there's anything otherwise similar about those movies, it just gave me that kind of enjoyment.
 
A disconcertingly large portion of that review is based around speculating about what people were thinking, and assumptions about studio machinations. There's a whole mess of assumptions here, and I'm not sure some of them really have that much to do with the film, or ring true. A few that caught my eye:


I don't usually hear "groundbreaking," but I definitely hear innovative, because it is. Sure, we've seen films about dreams before, and we've seen films that question the nature of reality, but many of them are wishy-washy, or only skim the surface of the idea, or treat it as some bizarre oddity we're just meant to accept. That's all well and good, but it's not quite the same thing as Inception.

But really, whether or not a film is groundbreaking or innovative is of secondary concern here. I realize that any time a film attempts to be thoughtful some fanboys, or teenagers, or whatever, flip out and declare it the deepest and most poignant thing they've ever seen. But just as bad is the rush of corresponding reviews which seemed less concerned with the film itself, and more concerned with offsetting a perceived overenthusiasm for it. "It's not as good as this particular group of people think" isn't the same as "It's not good."


I don't think so; the film wants us to think the scheme inside it is complicated, and it absolutely is.


Of course? When did this become some kind of established fact?

Really, if marketing had half the sway here that you seem to be suggesting, do you think they'd really have cast Marrion Cotillard? Do you think the relatively normal moviegoers that you seem to dislike so much know who she is, or find her to be a draw?

Let's consider the possibility that this is the story Nolan wanted to tell. Because we have every indication that it is. Nolan's gotten to make some pretty atypical films with some pretty large budgets, and there's no denying that he has a lot of pull when it comes to marketing, but his films consistently give far, far less away in their trailers and clips than basically every other major release.


Cobb remarks that she's picking things up unusually fast. That's a perfectly reasonable thing, given that she was recommended for the job by Cobb's father (in-law?) because she's an exceptional student. She gets to see more of Cobb because she's in a unique position; he has to tutor her in this art, and he doesn't have much time. She's also very bold; she violates Cobb's trust a bit to learn his secrets, he doesn't just offer them up.

Also, since when is being young and child-like something which undermines creativity? It's exactly the opposite.


The "action" is in their minds. He doesn't have to be gruff/strong/whatever.


I've re-read this paragraph three times, and I have no idea how not showing us what happens with the top in any way breaks the film's "rules."

Also, to my memory it doesn't wobble and stand-up straight. It just starts to wobble. But that's probably not important in regards to this point, anyway.


Simply pointing out that the music is urgent (how is it "stock" exactly?), or that the editing is quick, isn't an indictment in and of itself. You can't say "Michael Bay uses quick shots, Inception has quick shots, ergo Inception is as bad as a Michael Bay film." Sometimes, they're appropriate. For example, when you have a ton of things happening on four different layers of reality at once.

Also, I'm pretty sure that some of the shots in Ariadne's tutorial are held for quite awhile at some points, precisely to "enjoy the beauty of the mise en scene."


I don't think he has, and I see almost nothing to suggest that he has, but more importantly, I don't know why anyone would be so concerned and inherently put off by a film simply because they think it was trying to appeal to a large audience.
 
Ed's verdict sucks. This film is as original as it gets. I've never seen a film in which the architecture of the mind is invaded to extract and plant information. I've never seen a film where 4 -5 dream levels are displayed and cross cutted right before our eyes. If this film is not original, I don't know what is.
 
You want it to be a discussion? then go ahead discuss....

That's something you are not doing at all.. All you are doing is making statements, then making another one & then another one... Just like your statement above is unrelated as a reply to mine..

You just want to state flashy trivia to look all smart.. & you still haven't explained why you feel the action scenes were unnecessary in Inception, but you made a statement that you dont like action scenes.. so that makes it your own personal choice and viewpoint..

If you tell me why the scenes were not needed without comparing it to other films & directors style of filmmaking, then it would be a fair discussion.
 
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