Film: Inception
Cast includes: Leonardo DiCaprio (Titanic), Joseph Gordon-Levitt ((500) Days of Summer), Elen Page (Juno), Tom Hardy (Layer Cake), Ken Watanabe (Letters from Iwo Jima), Marion Cotillard (La Vie en Rose), Pete Postlethwaite (The Usual Suspects), Michael Caine (Harry Brown), Cillian Murphy (The Dark Knight)
Writer/Director: Christopher Nolan (Memento)
Genre: Sci-fi/Drama (2010)
In brief: When Cobb washes up on the beach, the children don’t see him, but Saito’s guards do. Saito agrees to meet with Cobb because he recognizes the totem… for Cobb, it’s a little top that he carries with him at all times. In a flashback Cobb asks Arthur, “What is the most resilient organism?” We might guess a bacteria or virus. Cobb tells us it’s "an idea." By the use of a device called Inception, Cobb and his team can go with a subject into a dream and mine his subconscious for ideas… as Cobb once did with Saito.
“Hi Daddy. When are you coming home?” We learn that Cobb can’t see his kids any more because he can’t go home. Saito uses this information to lure Cobb into the most dangerous and daring mission of his career. If Cobb does it, Saito will fix it so that Cobb can go home again. Instead of mining the subconscious for ideas, Saito wants Cobb to use Inception to plant an idea. Cobb’s team says it can’t be done, but Cobb believes it can. Perhaps by taking the subject to a dream within a dream, they can take the subject deep enough. And Cobb believes it’s possible. But at the last minute, Cobb decides that won’t be enough. They have to go into a dream within a dream within a dream (dream x3). At this depth, it’s almost impossible to tell what’s real and what isn’t. It’s all the more complicated because Cobb has a complex back story, that reappears at all the most dangerous times and puts the whole team at risk.
Inception is Mission Impossible on steroids. The actual story line is buried several levels down, under explosions, exotic locations, hallucinations, and special effects. The near impossible mission is to follow the plot. The filmmakers give us just enough glimpses of the plot for us to almost follow it, if we’re not too demanding. It’s really the sci-fi special effects that hold this movie together, assuming you’re willing to go on a ride with no expectations, other than the promise of wild visual effects. “Dreams feel real when we’re in them. It’s only when we wake up that we realize something was strange,” Cobb explains.
2 popped kernels
A hard-to-follow story with terrific special effects
Popcorn Profile
Primary Audience: Young adults
Gender Appeal: Macho
Distribution: Mainstream wide release
Mood: Neither upbeat nor somber
Tempo: Pure adrenalin rush
Visual Style: Computer effects
Character Development: Not that kind of film
Language: True to life
Social Significance: Pure entertainment
