Review: Inception
Imagine a world where not even your sub conscious is safe from the highest bidder, a world where people can infiltrate your dreams and find out whatever they want. A universe where it may just be possible to implant an idea in someone’s head that they would mistake for their own inspiration making them do whatever you wanted them to do. This is the world in which Dom Cobb lives; Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) is an extractor, a kind of point man for this mental SWAT team. After a job goes bad Cobb’s target turns into his employer. Sito (Ken Wantanabe), offers to clear the warrants waiting for Cobb in America in exchange for completing a job which most belive is impossible, Inception, the act of planting an idea in someone’s head that they will believe to be their own. Sito wants the newly inherited head of his biggest competitor to break up his conglomerate putting Sito’s company alone at the top. A spiriling landscape of dream after dream inside of dream Christopher Nolan creates world in which it can be difficult to tell which way is up much less what is real and what is not.
To call this movie visually striking would be like calling an erupting volcano hot, it doesn’t quite capture the entirety of the description you are trying to make. Nolan creates a universe so surreal that even as a viewer you are hard pressed to tell the real from the dreamscape. So much work was put into the logic and science from time displacement to outside influence he really captures how a real dream would show on screen. There are many times when you will sit back and realize that we all dream the same way because he just nails it. One thing you’ll never hear me talk about in a review is sound editing, this time however I feel I must bring it up, we’re talking Oscar caliber here. The sound is so, excuse the pun, pitch perfect that it thoroughly adds to every gunshot, explosion, and punch, it makes you REALLY feel what’s happening on screen.
When it comes to cast, this ensemble is second to none. Not a huge surprise here but Leo DiCaprio brings it as usual completely immersing himself in the character and further solidifying himself as my generation’s movie star. The real surprise comes in the form of Ellen Page who shreds the thought that she can only play sarcastic hipster with cutesy charm types with her performance here. Joseph Gordon-Levitt owns his slice of screen time and continues to be one of Hollywood’s most unappreciated great actors; this guy should’ve been getting major roles since Brick. Tom Hardy was the biggest surprise for me. This guy, whom I had no clue about before this film, is magnetic. He takes the third tier role he’s given and turns it into a shining point of the movie; every scene he’s in is made better because of his performance.
The story, confusing as it may be at times, is a completely well crafted labyrinth of WTF? Even after the film’s conclusion you find yourself wanting to watch the film again just to see what you might have missed. As your watching the twists and turns leave your head spinning full of questions which rings true to all of Christopher Nolan’s non Batman projects, (I.e., Memento, The Prestige). This leads into my only real complaints about the film. It may be just a little too confusing for some, if you want to turn your brain off and be entertained this ain’t the flick for you. Your thinking cap needs to be on tight before you see this movie and you may want to pack some Tylenol just in case. Past that Ellen Page’s character is the one who is as new to the idea of thought stealing and Inception as we are, yet they don’t take this opportunity to explain the world a little more clearly to us. They could have spent a few minutes explaining this world to Page’s character thereby letting us in on the secret but instead she just kind of gets it. It amounts to them saying “Hey we go into people’s dreams and steal stuff, you need to construct that world in your mind” to which she says, “Umm, okidok”. Obviously it’s a bit more eloquent than that but you get my drift. It doesn’t kill the movie…while you leave the theater with a clear picture of what’s transpired you will spend most of the movie wondering what the hell you are looking at.
Inception is amazing, period end of story. Great acting, an awesome story, and the coolest visuals I’ve seen since The Matrix and dare I say even better. If you go to see one movie in the theaters this summer make this the one, I know that’s cliché to say but there’s no other way to go about it. This movie is really unlike anything I’ve seen and needs to be watched on the big screen…there’s no waiting for DVD here, go see it now. I’m positive that we’ll be hearing much more about this one come Oscar season so make sure you get out to see what all the hype is about.
4.5 out of 5 Guttenbergs
