Inception

Inception is the type of movie where when you try to explain the plot to someone who has not already seen it you inevitably just end up confusing them and turning them away from it. The plot and all of its twists and turns is so different from anything people had seen up to that point that it became a must see film in 2010 that had people clamoring for an explanation to it all, especially the ambiguous ending that may or may not be tragic depending on your point of view. Whether or not you like the ending, the journey getting there is one well worth taking and is one guaranteed to not fall into the category of cookie-cutter. Director Christopher Nolan is not known for making generic films and, even when tasked with a super hero movie, will find a way to make it different than what is typically considered mainstream. Inception would go on to become his first Best Picture Oscar nomination but it wouldn’t be until 2023 that he would finally win one for his bio-pic Oppenheimer. 

So what is Inception actually about? It’s about implanting an idea into someone’s mind is such a way that the target thinks that idea is their own. Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) and Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) are “extractors,” hired to enter into people’s dreams and secure information from their unconscious minds. The job can be challenging, especially if the target is trained to recognize foreign visitors in their subconscious and can fight back. Even more challenging is implanting an idea into that person’s mind instead. Most people believe it is impossible but Cobb knows that it can be done. The two men are hired by Saito (Ken Watanabe), their previous target, who is impressed with their ability to layer dreams upon dreams to get deep into their target’s psyche. It is this ability that will allow someone to get deep enough to implant an idea successfully. Saito’s goal is to get Robert Fischer (Cillian Murphy), son of Saito’s primary business competitor and soon to inherit the business, to break up his father’s company and carve his own path in life. To accomplish this Cobb and Arthur will need to draft a full team and plan a dream within a dream within a dream, burrowing deep enough into Fischer’s mind that such a suggestion can take root and grow.

They recruit Ariadne (Elliot Page), a graduate student of architecture whose is particularly adept at building mazes. Her job will be to design the mental worlds that will populate Fischer’s mind when the team enters it. Eames (Tom Hardy) is brought aboard for his ability to impersonate people inside the dreams, an ability he can use to manipulate the target. Lastly, Yusuf (Dileep Tao), whose specialty is “avant-garde pharmacology.” Yusuf designs the drugs needed to put Fischer under deep enough to delve three levels into his dreams. Ariadne quickly discerns that Cobb is hiding something about why he personally cannot be the architect in this mission despite being the best in the world at it. She discovers that he and his late wife, Mal (Marion Cotillard), once went so deep into their dreams that she lost touch with reality and, upon returning, killed herself, framing him for her death. He is unable to return home to their children because he is wanted for her death and this job for Saito comes with the guarantee that, if successful, Saito will make a call that will clear Cobb’s name and grant him his freedom. He cannot be the architect because Mal lives in his subconscious and will try to sabotage the mission as she knows what he knows. Saito uses his money to arrange the access to Fischer and the time needed to perform the Inception with one final stipulation, he goes along with the team into Fischer’s mind. With everything in place the group subdues Fischer and they all enter his dreams. 

The Oscar winning visual effects were the selling point of the film when it was being promoted in the spring of 2010. When Ariadne is first brought into the dream world and discovers she can manipulate the elements she changes the laws of physics curving half of the inner city layout upside down and on top of the other half. This visual imagery was featured heavily in the trailers as well as during the Oscar’s ceremony. Later there will be a fight scene in a hotel hallway between Arthur and an unnamed goon that spins around like a funhouse tunnel in zero G. The effect is flawless and the action taking place within that effect is pulse quickening. This would be a film to see based on these visuals alone but would go on to be mostly forgotten if that were the case. Fortunately this is a Nolan film, not a Michael Bay film, and has more going for it than purely spectacle.

When the team first enters into Fischer’s mind they are not prepared for what they find. Fischer has been trained to resist these type of attacks and all hell breaks loose in the form of armed guards attacking the team at every junction. Saito has been shot fatally, something that in a normal extraction would just lead to him reawakening but, with the drug cocktail needed for this deep of a mission, means if he dies in the dream he will end up in what Cobb calls Limbo, a state so deep that he could be lost in there forever. This raises the stakes of the mission and adds a personal level of danger to the team. Things continue to unravel when Cobb first begins to see visages of his children playing, then Mal shows up and shoots Fischer himself in the dream, killing this version of him and sending his consciousness into limbo.

Christopher Nolan has gone on record stating that he wanted to direct a James Bond movie. He uses that 007 formula to great effect in the third level dream, a fortified bunker in the snowy mountains. This could have been lifted from On Her Majesty’s Secret Service with all the skiing, gunplay, fisticuffs and general espionage. It feels like Nolan trying to show the Bond producers that he is capable of making just the type of movie they are known for. More than that, though, it adds more variety to the action and provides a distinct setting making it easier to keep track of what levels of the dreams we are on at any given time. The surface level dream is in a van in the city being chased by gun toting assassins; The second level is in a hotel high rise. Later, when Cobb descends to limbo to rescue Fischer it will be depicted as a mixture of beach front land and buildings Cobb and Mal built to live in in their minds, a place she never wanted to leave. These four levels of dreams flash back and forth, sometimes rapidly, and making each level so distinct means we’re never confused as to where we are in it all.

Stripping away the action set pieces and the brilliant visuals this is a story about emotional scars. Cobb and Mal lived together in Limbo for fifty years, just a single day in the real world, and when Cobb finally took action to make her resurface, the idea he planted in her mind had unintentional effects he has to live with. Fischer has lived in his successful father’s shadow never feeling like he mattered enough to him. The last word his father ever said to him was “disappointed,” something he interprets as his father never loving or accepting him. This feeling of inadequacy is latched onto by Cobb and his team and forms the basis for their inception. Both of these men will have to face their demons in the dream world and attempt to come to terms with them. It’s a level of depth that effect films rarely plumb and it is for precisely this reason that Inception is leaps and bounds above most CGI effect heavy action films. Nolan is a master at crafting films that stand out above their contemporaries by addressing complicated human emotions and motivations while simultaneously delivering on the pulse pounding action.

When the movie finally comes to an end on the surface things look like they’ve all worked out for everyone. The idea has been successfully planted in Fischer’s mind, no one died in the process, and Cobb has been granted the ability to finally return home to his kids. The film doesn’t allow us to fully believe in this, though and we’re given just a sliver of a doubt over whether Cobb actually got out with the rest of his team. Cobb uses his own trick for determining if he is back in the real world, but walks away before he can find out indicating that he no longer really wants to know anymore. All he cares about anymore is being with his kids, real or not. With that note the film ends and, depending on your point of view, you get to decide for yourselves if this is a happy ending or a tragic one. Either way it feels cathartic and Cobb has earned that catharsis. He is an emotionally damaged man, haunted by a decision that spiraled beyond his control and deserves to finally be happy again.

Academy Award Nominations:

Best Picture: Emma Thomas and Christopher Nolan

Best Original Screenplay: Christopher Nolan

Best Score: Hans Zimmer

Best Sound Editing: Richard King (won)

Best Sound Mixing: Lora Hirschberg, Gary Rizzo, and Ed Novick (won)

Best Art Direction: Guy Hendrix Dyas, Larry Dias and Doug Mowat

Best Cinematography: Wally Pfister (won)

Best Visual Effects: Paul Franklin, Chris Corbould, Andrew Lockley and Peter Bebb (won)

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Release Date: July 16, 2010

Running Time: 148 Minutes

Rated PG-13

Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Ken Watanabe, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Marion Cotillard, Elliot Page, Tom Hardy, Cillian Murphy, Tom Berenger and Michael Cane

Directed by: Christopher Nolan