Review: INCEPTION

This year has been a maelstrom of disappointment. Without Toy Story 3 and surprises like the How to Train Your Dragon and Exit through the Gift Shop, I’m sure I would have gone into a cinematic coma sometime between Alice in Wonderland and Clash of the Titans. All eyes have been on Inception to save the summer from disappearing into a black hole of mediocrity. I don’t want to spoil too much, because I believe that Inception should be experienced first-hand. Much like The Matrix, you need to see it for yourself. It’s a rare achievement of synchronicity across all levels of production, and I personally believe that Chris Nolan has outdone himself with this movie.

There have been a lot of comparisons to Kubrick drawn recently, but really, comments like that are just a disservice to Nolan and his talents. Granted both filmmakers tend to tell cold, visually impressive stories, but Kubrick wrestles with ironies and the duality of man, while Nolan looks at obsession and asks “What drives man to do what he does?” Now, the two often question reality and our perception of it in their work. We see this with films like Memento, Eyes Wide Shut, 2001, and now, Inception. But I think too often do people spout out the name Kubrick in an attempt to manifest a comparison to brilliance or perfection in filmmaking, but a director like Paul Thomas Anderson is a far more accurate a choice in regards to substance and style. None of this is to suggest that Nolan’s work on Inception is anything less than fantastic, however.

Inception is an idea that came out of what I can only assume was some kind of triple-leveled fever dream of Chris Nolan’s. I love the concept, because it’s purely ambitious. Inception revolves around Dom Cobb (DiCaprio) who, in an attempt to return to his family, agrees to one last heist for shady businessman Saito (Watanbe). Now here’s where it gets crazy. Cobb specializes in stealing information from people’s minds by inducing a shared dream-state. The process is called extraction. Saito’s proposition involves a process far more risky and is near-impossible to pull off. The job would require Cobb and his team to enter into a dream that’s three levels deep (a dream within a dream within a dream) to try and implant an idea into the mind of one of Saito’s corporate-world competitors. This process is called inception, and the problem is that in order for the idea to be believed by the person whose mind they are invading, the conscious mind must believe that it came up with the idea, or it will simply discard the notion.

I want to talk to the screenwriters out there for just a second. You know that idea that you’ve been chiseling away at for year; the story that plagues your thoughts? The plot that’s so intricate that it only makes sense to you? The one that you’ve been tweaking and rewriting since it first popped into your head? As a writer, there have been a handful of stories that I’ve come up with over the last 6 years or so, which I’ve been hammering away at since.

In my mind, the twists and turns are perfect, but the stopgap has always been the execution of the idea. How do I properly convey these ideas to an audience without losing them? Am I being pretentious in my presumptions, and is this a dream-project that’ll never see the light of day? I know I’m going to need to grab the hand of the audience and never let go, because if I do, they’ll get swept up in the world I’ve tried to create, and it’ll fail. The critics won’t call it intricate, they’ll call it confusing or complicated. It won’t be deep, it’ll be muddled. These are fears you have as a writer when you’re trying to do something completely different; when you attempt to break out of box where “they” say originality has been dead for ages. Watching Inception is like viewing one of those ideas perfectly realized. For lack of a better expression, it sails uncharted territory.

I can’t remember the last movie I saw that relied so heavily on the previous moment driving the next. That’s how a movie is supposed to work, but rarely do we see one where the last scene is crucial to how the next one unfolds, and without each moment like that leading into the next, the whole thing would just fall apart. Inception may have one of the most finely crafted stories I’ve ever seen because of this.

You may get lost along the way, and you may even have questions, but at no point is there an instance of oversight on the plot’s side. Everything is accounted for, you just have to pay close attention and concede that your confusion is just another aspect of this world. Inception utilizes more than just creative visuals and state of the art CGI to tell its story, but perhaps, its greatest effect is the brilliantly written script.

The last movie to be this visually creative is The Matrix. Before the Wachowskis gave us an army of CGI clones, they utilized amazing practical effects, which changed movies from that point forward. While there’s nothing in Inception that is as groundbreaking as The Matrix, I’d argue that it uses a perfectly optimized extension/evolution of some of that tech. After the Pirates of the Caribbean sequels, King Kong, and Avatar, we all accept near-photo realistic CGI as just a tool of filmmaking. I find the work infinitely impressive as I’m consistently blown away after each technological landmark, but with Inception, what I find more impressive is the amazing practical effects that Nolan is known for.

At times, the action reminds us of the best of James Bond, or even more recently to Nolan’s The Dark Knight. Specifically, the scene with Gordon-Levitt in the zero-G hallway just blows my mind. I know how the effect works, but how seamless it is here is what impresses me most. The firefights, the chases through rainy streets and snow-covered mountains, and the gravity-defying acrobatics are all innovative and exciting. As CGI history will tell us, the effects are only as impressive as an actor’s ability to interact or react to what we see on screen.

Luckily, Inception houses a great ensemble cast, and as much as I love Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page and Cillian Murphy, I’m compelled to single out one actor. Can Leo DiCaprio please win an Oscar this year? Honestly, the guy’s been snubbed since What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, and this year DiCaprio has given us two brilliant performances with Inception and Shutter Island. Inception finds DiCaprio far more brooding and overall the more intriguing character, because he is constantly playing off of what isn’t really there. While in Shutter Island he gives a great performance that is filled to the brim with paranoia and intensity, in Inception he continues to fight a battle with his past, which is far more interesting, because he’s essentially a ticking time-bomb. He can’t be trusted, and even worse, neither can his subconscious. His character is as deep as the levels of dreams that Cobb and his team are traveling through.

I think The Dark Knight will always be my favorite of Nolan’s movies, because it just appeals to me on so many levels. TDK is literally a perfect storm; a griping crime drama starring Batman & the Joker. I find the battle between chaos and order constantly entertaining, intriguing, and mesmerizing. What scares me is that Inception might actually be a better movie. I love that it takes its time to explain the rules of the world, and that nothing is ever rash but rather progressive. There aren’t any silly throwaway lines like “I didn’t sign up for this!” or “That’s not good!” which only damper what is a near-phenomenal movie. I guess the truth will be revealed with time, so I’ll reserve my opinion on which of Nolan’s films are better until a later date. I can’t recommend it enough, though. In the Summer of Suck 2010, Inception is a lighthouse that beckons Hollywood to stray away from the jagged rocks of remakes and the cliff sides of sequels. Hopefully, someone is paying attention, because original material is what we desperately need right now, and if it means more movies like this, then how can the plea be ignored?

Overall: 10 out of 10

Directed by Christopher Nolan. Written by Christopher Nolan. Cinematography by Wally Pfister. Edited by Lee Smith. Production Design by Guy Dyas. Music by Hans Zimmer.

Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page, Ken Watanbe, Cillian Murphy, Tom Hardy, Dileep Rao, Tom Berenger, Marion Cotillard, Pete Postlethwaite and Michael Caine.