Inception review

Inception
2010
148 minutes
rated PG-13


There are plenty of films that present the notion to the viewer that characters on screen are inhabiting a world that is not grounded in reality. But what happens when the characters are in a dream. Reality is thrown out the window because dreams can be on such grand scale that they border on infinite. Inception is written, produced and directed by Christopher Nolan and is a very sophisticated and beautiful film that hits you with such a stunning blow to the mind you'll wake up gasping for air just as Leonardo DiCaprio is on the shore of his own subconscious. Ok let's get the obvious out there; Inception is a science fiction thriller with a tightly coiled plot, cerebral conceits and formidable ambition. I honestly feel sorry for some of you "popcorn" movie goers, by mid reel you're going to be left scratching your head wondering what is going on. Let me save you the trouble, watch the movie let it wash over and drown you and save the head scratching for later. And for some there will be a later because Inception is that kind of movie. It is complex and you'll want to see it again.

But perhaps I was to harsh on my average cinema attendees, Inception is one of the few films that can be enjoyed on a casual and more open minded level. Come to think of it, the protagonist himself takes a journey on pretty much the same level. I'm referring to Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio), he makes his living navigating the minds of other people, sharing their dreams and stealing ideas in an elaborate psychological scam known as "extraction." To complete his task he uses his right hand man Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) and a sleep-inducing gadget, his business is mostly involved with high level corporate espionage. But the movie opens, a client named Saito (Ken Watanabe) hires Cobb for a collectively different task: Rather than steal an idea, he wants Cobb and Arthur to plant one in the mind of Robert Fischer (Cillian Murphy), the would-be heir to an energy conglomerate, in a process called "inception."

To say the job is hard is an understatement. Cobb has to gather a group of "dream warriors" to make sure the mission goes off without a hitch. The group includes a slick forger named Eames (Tom Hardy), a chemist named Yusuf (Dileep Rao) and a young architect named Ariadne (Ellen Page), she is in charge of designing the mazelike dreamscapes much of "Inception" transpires in, she also acts as an essential proxy for film goers who are likely to find themselves utterly lost in the director's own convoluted ideas. All of that notwithstanding, the set pieces are nothing short of amazing. Nolan reportedly used as few CGI effects as possible while making this film and it shows. Nolan sets the example of the best kind of filmmaking, unrestricted from the laws of time, space and even gravity, but never from the most basic rules of good story telling fiction.