[Tiste Simeon]

I wonder what would have happened if Christopher Nolan had taken on Transformers 2...

[Aptorian]

Just came back from the Cinema. Great film.

All though I don't want to be as big a critic as Stone Monkey, I agree that the film failed on an intellectual level.

I'd heard from several sources that this was a complex film that you might need to watch several time to fully understand. I don't agree. The films manuscript was excellently put together, to such an extent that my hungover friend wasn't having any trouble keeping pace. It is not a hard film to get, yeah sure, there's hidden meanings and easter eggs all over the place, but over all it's a complex but straight forward story.

That's not really something to be disappointed about. After all it was labelled an Action film, but it was an action film that trying to be too clever in my opinion.

I think I would have liked the film better if it had been less about the action and more about the journey and the notion of dream manipulation. Not just Cobbs absolution but more about dreams themselves. I don't think there was enough psychology or dream interpretation in it. I think what I wanted was more of David Lynchs insanity and less of Nolans sublime sense of design and structure. I wanted things to not make sense, because, despite the presence of the architect, I don't believe that dreams are that logical or well structured.

EDIT: Also I wanted more interference by Mal. I liked her presence as a monkey wrench.

This post has been edited by Aptorian: 02 August 2010 - 08:08 PM

[polishgenius]

Aptorian, on 02 August 2010 - 08:06 PM, said:

I think I would have liked the film better if it had been less about the action and more about the journey and the notion of dream manipulation. Not just Cobbs absolution but more about dreams themselves. I don't think there was enough psychology or dream interpretation in it. I think what I wanted was more of David Lynchs insanity and less of Nolans sublime sense of design and structure. I wanted things to not make sense, because, despite the presence of the architect, I don't believe that dreams are that logical or well structured.

You ever seen Paprika? Anime film that I like for precisely that reason.

This post has been edited by polishgenius: 02 August 2010 - 09:33 PM

[Tiste Simeon]

[Thelomen Toblerone]

Aptorian, on 02 August 2010 - 08:06 PM, said:

I'd heard from several sources that this was a complex film that you might need to watch several time to fully understand. I don't agree. The films manuscript was excellently put together, to such an extent that my hungover friend wasn't having any trouble keeping pace. It is not a hard film to get, yeah sure, there's hidden meanings and easter eggs all over the place, but over all it's a complex but straight forward story.

That's not really something to be disappointed about. After all it was labelled an Action film, but it was an action film that trying to be too clever in my opinion.

See, I knew literally nothing about this film when I went to see it. I'd heard it was "good." That's all. I had no expectation it would be complex, and thus wasn't disappointed. I did find it difficult to follow at some points though due to my failure to understand what Mal and Saito were saying at some points. Pathetic I know, but it was before noon and I was hungover, and I just couldn't pick up what was being said.

[Pig Iron]

I raise you Inland Empire, Lynch latest. Great movie, but one of the craziest ever made. Dream, psychosis or maybe even dive into the collective unconscious? Do I want every movie to be like IE? Please no. So happy the powers in Hollywood allow stuff like Inception to be made, a roller-coaster that even my in-laws enjoyed, but with some nice twists.

[Slow Ben]

Thelomen Toblerone, on 02 August 2010 - 11:50 PM, said:

Aptorian, on 02 August 2010 - 08:06 PM, said:

I'd heard from several sources that this was a complex film that you might need to watch several time to fully understand. I don't agree. The films manuscript was excellently put together, to such an extent that my hungover friend wasn't having any trouble keeping pace. It is not a hard film to get, yeah sure, there's hidden meanings and easter eggs all over the place, but over all it's a complex but straight forward story.

That's not really something to be disappointed about. After all it was labelled an Action film, but it was an action film that trying to be too clever in my opinion.

See, I knew literally nothing about this film when I went to see it. I'd heard it was "good." That's all. I had no expectation it would be complex, and thus wasn't disappointed. I did find it difficult to follow at some points though due to my failure to understand what Mal and Saito were saying at some points. Pathetic I know, but it was before noon and I was hungover, and I just couldn't pick up what was being said.

Yeah, I think it really helped that i went and saw it the night it came out. The only thing i knew about it was i thought the commercial looked cool so i was shocked to get something like that.

I think if i'd have went into it expecting something more it would have been a different experience.

[cerveza_fiesta]

No cable TV means I never see previews of movies. I usually go based on friends' reports. I have a couple buddies that are huge movie addicts and have comparable taste to my own....usually its a safe bet if they say its good.

My only preview before Inception was "dang dude...that was a sweet movie"

Had no idea quite how sweet.

@Stone Monkey's comment (before back and forth with Gem that I didn't read)

I totally agree with your assessment of the characters, but I don't think at all that they fail the movie. To be fair, there was more character development in Inception than all 3 Matrix movies combined IMO. For what was essentially an action movie, they did pretty dang good compared to most action flicks.

Sure the characters were a bit cliche (except Leo's, which was fairly original I thought) but that's the standard technique in action movies to avoid character development altogether. If you pick an identifiable cliche'd rich asian fellow for your "rich guy" character, you don't have to develop the character. His history and motivations are conveniently assumed. You (as a producer) get to spend less time on talking scenes and more time on awesome action scenes and things that attract people to action movies.

Plot-wise, yes...they could have gone a bit deeper or gone a bit more on the thinky side, but then it would have been "one of those boring intellectual movies" with too many layers that would have shot over the heads of the target audience. The plot was more than sufficient to tie the action together, and it provided an original and entertaining story on top of that, which is a leap above most films in the action genre.

To each his own of course. I thought it was a treat all around.

[masan's saddle]

Finally got around to seeing this on Saturday night and enjoyed it.

That said though I felt it lost it's way a couple of times in the editing dept and in terms of the denouement it could have been handled a bit better. Minor quibbles.

The "what's real and what's not" debate has been well covered upthread but I started getting the feeling that the whole "mission" was designed purely to bring Cobb out of his funk. Getting him to focus on completing the mission so he could see his kids again was clever as very early on it becomes apparent that they are the only positive thing he clings onto. He's lost in a sea of guilt, the interesting question for me then is who instigated his "rescue".

Ambiguity can be a wonderful thing but for me Michael Caine's presence at the airport at the end and when he finally sees his kids again speaks volumes. How, why and what the fug is he doing there ? He was in "Paris" when we first meet him and he then meets Cobb off the plane in a very dreamlike sequence at the end of the mission. He was not part of the team yet he provided the architect.........

Hmmmm, questions. Good stuff.

[dktorode]

masan, on 04 August 2010 - 12:08 AM, said:

Ambiguity can be a wonderful thing but for me Michael Caine's presence at the airport at the end and when he finally sees his kids again speaks volumes. How, why and what the fug is he doing there ? He was in "Paris" when we first meet him and he then meets Cobb off the plane in a very dreamlike sequence at the end of the mission. He was not part of the team yet he provided the architect.........

Hmmmm, questions. Good stuff.

He was on his way to see the kids, remember...cobb gave him some prezzies to give to the kids

Another mechanic i think some of you are missing is that when someone dies in a dream within a dream they simply wake up in the next level, much like the kick wakes you up in the next level. So anyone who got killed in the lower levels would just be waking up in the next level up.
Limbo from death only happened on the first level "death" as the person could not wake up "for real" because of the powerful drugs.
So the leap off the building in the fourth/final layer was just a way of getting to the previous level...then they rode all the kicks back to number one.

This mechanic was shown right in the beginning when they are in Ken Watanabe's dream within a dream and cobb shoots arthur.

This post has been edited by dktorode: 04 August 2010 - 09:35 AM

[masan's saddle]

@ DK I've only seen the film once and I can't remember anything about gifts for the kids, but if it's as you say.....damn your eyes man !

[Silencer]

He's right - from the phone call when he tells the kids he will have grandpa bring gifts, then in the scene in the Paris university, where he gives the gifts over to be taken to the kids.

[Morgoth]

I think what I enjoyed most about this movie was the technical aspect of it. How in what we're told to be real life the shifts between scenes are sharp and violent to the point of being jarring at times, which fits nicely with the whole do you remember how you got here aspect of dreams. Also, that narrowing corridor in Mombasa just seemed so very dreamlike.

That there is no character development to be had outside of Cobb can easily be explained away by the others being Jungian archetypes created through Cobb's subconscious(Mal being the shadow presence thing obviously. Arthur could be the hero - it's been a while since I read this stuff ).

As for whether his totem topples or not. To my mind the totems do not separate between reality or dream. It can only show whether you're inside someone else's dream. If you're in your own dream you would instinctively know how your totem behaves ergo it would be useless as an indicator. Someone else would however not be able to predict the properties of your totem, much like the green rug that was not made of wool. Thus what happens to the totem at the end is rather irrelevant.

Furthermore, if what we're shown to be reality is the actual reality, why the hell would Mal sit on the ledge of the opposing building? In front of a room seemingly identical to their own suite?

Apart from that, I enjoyed the film though I didn't find it as clever as I was told it would be. I expected to have my mind blown and as such I found myself analyzing everything, which took away part of the enjoyment for sure. Nevertheless, it was a good movie experience, and I'm pretty sure I would've paid just to see the hallway fight and Bronson.

Also, the suits were awesome.

This post has been edited by Morgoth: 05 August 2010 - 09:47 AM

[dktorode]

Mal was not in the opposite building but merely in a window that happens to face another other window of the same building/room/suite....ive seen buildings like that before in movies....like a little u shaped apartment thing.

All supposed to add to the ambiguous nature of the film.

I believe that every person is supposed to make up his or her own mind as to if it was all a dream or real at the end...Its purposely open ended so that each of us can perceive what really happened by our own unique view of how we see things (what angle) much like the stair case, it either ends or endlessly continues etc etc.
so the argument about if it is a dream or not is silly since each person is supposed to see it differently and to decide for themselves what they believe it should be.

im rambling arent i?

[Mentalist]

k, just saw it. people around here were ravoing like lunatics about how awesome and thought-provoking the film was, and my boss nigh-INSISTED that I watch it ASAP.

I have few comments. As an action flick, it was solid. THe premise was cool. The story.... sigh. I cannot STAND charactrs that are "tragically flawed" to the point where they become obstinate tools, and that's exactly what Cobb was. I had to grit my teeth to continue watching every time we would be told yet ANOTHER thing that he neglected to mention in relation to himself. I'll be honest, throughtout the movie, I was far more interested in whether or not inception is possible than I was in his own Catharsis with Mol. and yes, throughtout the entire movie, I've been hearing "Mol", short of "Molly", so sue me if I remove a hidden layer of complexity right there.

In short: I liked it. I definitely don't see why there's so much hype about it being the best, most thought-provoking thing ever, though.

[Aptorian]

[Mezla PigDog]

I just saw it. A fine way to spend a Sunday afternoon. On the car on the way home we just kept saying "Don't think about it or it's gonna fall to pieces". The chemicals man, the chemicals! How does everyone everywhere know about Extraction? Argh, it's happening already.

If I don't think about it, it was totally spiffing. So I'm not reading the thread cos it's gonna make me think about it! Not as good as The A-Team

[stone monkey]

And that is the crux of the problem with this movie for me. It so very desperately wants to be the kind of film that stands up to close scrutiny, but it so very obviously doesn't. In this respect it's actually a lot like The Matrix.

Fun, but disposable.

[Raymond Luxury Yacht]

For the record, we can drop any speculation on what was meant by the fact that the actress who played Mol played the lady who sang the french song in a different movie. It has been stated by Nolan it was a coincidence, and he actually wanted to change the song just to avoid this type of speculation, but was persuaded not to because the song fit so well.

Did anyone else thkn that the guy who used to be in 3rd rock from the Sun looked a lot like Heath Ledger in this movie?

~RLY, not good with names, can't be bothered to look them up

[Mezla PigDog]

Raymond Luxury Yacht, on 09 August 2010 - 07:09 PM, said:

Did anyone else thkn that the guy who used to be in 3rd rock from the Sun looked a lot like Heath Ledger in this movie?

Yes! It was uncanny. He's Joseph Gordon-Levitt (I think). The first 45mins of the movie, all I could think was "Who does he remind me of?" and it was definitely Heath Ledger. I wonder if he's going to be in the next Batman movie......