Inception (with implanted spoilers)

NPR hated it.

Some of the press I take with a grain of salt. Namely these gems:

"None of this prattling drivel adds up to one iota of cogent or convincing logic. You never know who anyone is, what their goals are, who they work for or what they're doing.--Rex Reed

Uhm, I'm not exactly the best at keeping up with fast-developing movies, and I understood what was going on and had a vested interest in it. Talk about a smug "I didn't get it, so nobody will" review.

"Inception may have been directed by Christopher Nolan, but Nolan's dreams are apparently directed by Michael Bay.

Ahh, yes, because all surreal action sequences=Michael Bay.

With that being said, I do understand to a degree why some don't like it. It really depends on how you feel about emotionally detached, mechanical cinema. Most of the critique I see targets the stunted emotional content, which is a fair point (just not one that I personally cared about).

sorry that second review was from Salon.com

great costumes in this

I'm at work right now and all I can think of is the last 30 minutes of this movie. that does it, I gotta go again tonight. I'm not a big "see movies multiple times" in the theatre guy, but Nolan seems to have that effect on me.

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a lot of the complaints seem to be that it has no heart/is all cerebral sleight-of-hand. the scene near the end (or, at the bottom?) between leo and [his memory of] his wife, where he rejects his own projection of her, reminds her that they did grow old together (but is really talking to and maybe forgiving himself) was pretty moving...the stuff with the kids felt a little unreal throughout, which in retrospect makes sense.

this could have been a disaster many times over, but i felt like i was watching someone at the very top of their game operating with complete comfort and even flair in areas where a wrong move in any direction could topple the whole house of cards, which was pretty exhilarating. so many good scenes!

yea really the emotional center of the movie is Leo, and the other players really revolve around him and his aenema. I'm fine with that too.

it was all kinda

http://lechampo.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/cradle-thumb.jpg

Thoroughly enjoyed it. Lots to think about. Would definitely want to see it again reasonably soon.

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So, how much was "real"? 5 minutes, of none of it? Did the top fall?

Or not of.

this was pretty great. haters to the left.

Henry, please explain that picture reference to us philistines.

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I'm torn on whether the top fell. At least three times it buckled as if it was going to, but then didn't. The look on Leo's face when he returned to his house and saw his kids hinted that it might not have -- he seemed confused and disoriented, although that could also be attributed to seeing your kids for the first time in years.

In addition, he looked surprised when he woke up, as if he didn't know how he got there...which was different than the reactions of everyone else when they woke up (ie, their eyes opened, and they looked alert and relatively calm).

As far as how much of it was real, I'm pretty convinced that it was mostly real, but who can tell, really? Since the movie was playing on the "reality is what you know" theme (which has been done frequently), if you wanted to get real analytical, you could assume that the *rules* Leo explained were in the dream rather than reality, and then none of it was real!

I tend to go for the literal approach and assume it was all real except for possibly the reunion with his children, and of course the dream within dream sequences.

God I can't wait to see this again.

Yeah, the last 45 minutes were nothing if not zero gravity D.W. Griffith.

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hey guyz what if the movie iznt real?

Zero-gravity JGL is all-time great. That fight scene was astonishing, and played so low-key in so many ways, too.

This thread should be renamed Incept-SPOILER SPOILERS SPOIILLLLLLEERSS

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At one point quite early on, when I registered the top and that it was Mal's, I wondered whether maybe everything was Cobb inside her dream.

I'm convinced that Juno's name in the film is toomsignificant her her to be anything but a subconscious projection. DiCaprio as Theseus, Cotillard as Minotaur.

After this and GI Joe I am now utterly convinced that JGL will play Joker in the third Batman film by Nolan.

Although I will say this movie explains a lot. Extraction must be where the award winning screenplays I remember writing went!

also would love to see someone blame a one night stand on inception

locations in this were great. pretty much everywhere featured apart from about two scenes are places I could happily spend extended amounts of time in.

just bought my ticket for tonight (not in IMAX this time). this sadly makes the second consecutive Nolan film I've seen twice in the first 24 hours of release.

I'm going to need a loooooooong nap after this.

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ok as far as the end, the top thing, etc....

i swear that i noticed this when he goes thru customs at the end to meet michael caine....

when he's showing his passport to the dude, and he's flipping through it, i thought all the pages looked blank, like maybe that was some detail that wasn't fully fleshed out in the dream world..

unless i didn't see it correctly...or maybe it means nothing

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At one point I got a little confused and thought Lukas Haas was the kid from Dazed & Confused who's in Waking Life (he isn't), and the thing about digital screens / clocks from that struck me as something that would have been awesome if up for investigation in Inception. I was kind of looking for writing or lack of all the way through.

Saw this this morning. Leo has just about mastered disguising what a bad actor he is. Aside from that, god, so many images from this are playing over in my mind.

Loved the style of it too, though I thought Leo, and some of the others (esp Cillian Murphy) were like Nolan surrogates in how they looked; the hair, the clothing...

I've gotta say, having never really liked DiCaprio when he was younger, he's really growing on me as he grows older and more Jack Nicholson-like.

^^^ I hated him in the Basketball Diaries days but have really enjoyed him of late. And his histrionics were well in check in this movie.

looking forward to seeing this at the IMAX in 2011

gukbe to the left

Just back from IMAX in m/cr. I thought there were some serious longueurs during the set-up and was actually getting a bit twitchy after an hour, but then the great sprawling finale from when they go "in" on the flight is *stupendous* and redeemed the whole film for me. Loved all the stuff with the team (Tom Hardy in particular is A+++ great) and Nolan's technique in holding the tiers of dream together was stunning.

Tom Hardy was indeed awesome, his interplay with JGL was first class.

A couple of real lols from their bickering, but he also seemed very at ease with the serious business of thumping/shooting/blowing people up. Mind you, if you've seen Bronson his dedication to the craft is pretty clear, an absolute brute in that.

Tom Hardy was indeed awesome

I looked him up on imdb to see why he looked so familiar to me, and it turns out he was that horrible Jean Luc Picard clone in Star Trek Nemesis!

He's phenomenal in Bronson. Good actor generally, I first noticed him in the BBC4 remake of A For Andromeda a few years ago. Always notice when he pops up randomly in something - a tiny cameo in Marie Antoiette, supporting role in Guy Ritchie's godawful Rock'n'Rolla. He usually plays nutters/weirdos. Hopefully this will lead to bigger, better roles.

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it was definitely a dream at the end--the kids were wearing the same goddamn clothes theyd been wearing all movie

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Haha, good, simple point. Well noticed / deduced.

yea when I see it later tonight there's like five items mentioned in this thread alone that I plan on taking a close look at.

i would probably have liked this more when i was 18 and smoked more wed. at that point i hearted the heck out of films about dreams/reality/memory/_____. like 'brazil' and 'existenz' got under my skin in a big way.

liked so much about this, and it's obviously amazing for a blockbuster, but it was never uncanny. (better than 'the matrix' though.)

too much exposition, and a little too little clarity about what was going on from time to time. my fave moment was probably the train coming down the street. but i don't entirely understand the limbo thing. the time differential is an interesting idea and very cinematic in execution, but the limbo idea felt way too far away from anything i've experienced.

lot of it reminded me of the collapsing memories in 'eternal sunshine', but not in a good way.

helped out by pretty amazing cast: hardy and jgl espesh.

maybe as i get older and jaded and lyfe gets more and more real i get less interested in exploring the idea that hey man dreams, reality, what's really real nahmean?

you smoke wed.

i actually dug the amoutn of exposition, i was impressed that it was pretty well thought-out, except for the time disparity between the different levels which they cheated a lot.

mostly i liked this.

when shit gets real though dude just can't direct a fast-paced action sequence to save his life.

also: shutter island much?

lol'd at max's line that leo shd've kept the accent

but yeah s0 much like 'shutter island'. tragic dead wife and all. liked 'em both.

probably going to see this again as part of 'curb your enthusiasm' type mix-up. might help.

juno's line 'whose subconcious is this' was lol but im kind of like -- that's a fair question? she designs the thing. but why is it only leo's mental artefacts who intrude.

sorta reminded me of that guinness ad with the big beat soundtrack from the 1990s, as well as 'intolerance'.

tragic CRAZY dead wife who he couldnt save from her craziness no less

sorta reminded me of that guinness ad with the big beat soundtrack from the 1990s, as well as 'intolerance'.

― I’ll put you in a f *ckin Weingarten you c*nt! (history mayne), Friday, July 16, 2010 7:54 PM (31 seconds ago) Bookmark

oh man that is so one for the print campaign

guess i was also a bit disappointed that shit didnt get weirder and cooler the deeper they got. leo & marion really spent 50 years designing a generic-looking city with a bunch of their old houses?? they weren't having magical adventures and flying thru space and shit?

also the way the staircase thing finally got pulled out i really expected j g levitt to actually say "lol"

eternal sunshine handled dreams/memories way more "realistically" and interesting

also the way the staircase thing finally got pulled out i really expected j g levitt to actually say "lol"

― al-goreda (s1ocki), Friday, July 16, 2010 7:56 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i actually did "lol" because what he said was "paradox" and it was really dumb

leo & marion really spent 50 years designing a generic-looking city with a bunch of their old houses?

exackly! it was a really depressing place, and kind of empty of people? i dunno, the dreams that 'get' me are ones involving people i haven't seen in years. probably more like 'land of the lost' than the video game 'civilization' (iirc, i haven't played a video game in a while).

xpost

otm x 2

ken watanabe was pretty great too i thought

he looks kinda like jimmy smits