Inception
After a lame start to summer at the box office things are finally looking fresh. “Inception” seems to be the exception and an extraordinary one at that. Starring the brilliant Leonardo DiCaprio as Cobb, a mastermind of Extraction, the theft of an idea from a dream. He seems to be a mastermind at this feat until he comes in contact with his subconscious beings, one his widow Mal (Marion Cotillard). Mal has a hold over Cobb that seems to cause a distraction in the dreams causing disaster wherever she shows up.
Cobb is desperate to get out of this line of work of Extraction, but he must do one final job so he can return home to his children. Cobb is requested to implant an idea successfully during someone’s dream. This plot is known as Inception and will take a valiant diverse group of people to pull off. As demonstrated taking over a dream is not as simple as it seems. You must be in their dream and become invisible to that persons subconscious. If you become noticed you will be targeted. During the dream you don’t want to make any big changes that would also alert the subconscious. You want everything to be as realistic as possible.
That is where a great architect comes in to assemble the dream. Cobb is introduced by his father to one of his most promising students Ariadne (Ellen Page). Cobb takes her into a dream to show her the ability she would have to design it. Ariadne begins building her world and quickly learns the projections and shapes are there from the dreamer’s subconscious, where the dream world is created by the designer, not the dreamer. Making accuracy the most important.
Setting the plan into motion Cobb begins laying all the ground work with partner Arthur (Joseph Gordon Levitt). He seeks out an imitator, someone who can impersonate someone close to the dreamer, a driver who can handle the intensity of the dream and keep the group safe when they advance down to another level of dreaming. Once the team is assembled he sets out a complicated layered dream. One that could have life altering consequences.
“Inception” is mind boggling. A great masterpiece that challenges viewers scene by scene. Christopher Nolan does not disappoint with his amazing tale which includes some of the best special effects this year. It’s inventive and fresh and definitely what a lagging box office needed this year. The only film I have seen that has captured my attention and still has me thinking outside the box days later. The cast was made up of the best and the chemistry they shared was superb. Joseph Gordon Levitt shined brightly and Ellen Page proved to be a force to be reckoned with. As expected Leonardo DiCaprio was a show stopper up to the final act. “Inception” proves to be a box office’s dream come true!
Odd: I saw a movie with a whole lot of car chases and shaky-camera gunfights and one long, drawn-out sequence where people in white snowsuits were shooting at other people in white snowsuits. There was a clever bit where Joseph Gordon-Levitt was running up walls and across ceilings, but other than that, the “Inception” I saw made either version of “The Italian Job” look like the biggest heist-movie Oscar-sweeps contender of all time. Oh, dear: you fell for the “complicated is automatically genius” hype, didn’t you…?