Inception (with implanted spoilers)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jHJwgA54Gqk

i see this film becoming a litmus test for me

also the cinematography is not v remarkable, i groaned when they cut to those waves

like i said above, a dream movie with NO ATMOSPHERE

just remembered another wtf moment, leo getting caught in the narrow alleyway while on the run in mombassa - except his shoulders are still at 45 degrees to the walls! "oh lord how can i squeeze through this alley, if only there were some way of turning my body fully sideways ;_;"

I'm probably being dumb but why does Mal jump out of an apartment on the other side of the street?

Because it's NOT REAL.

I wonder if I was so emotionally uninvolved because it was a dream, and I could give a fuck what happens in dreams -- turn off as soon as characters in other books or films start relating their dreams, and also in real life.

There are also other ways to tell if you're dreaming that surely Mal could have tried out. Writng's a big one: printed words rarely stay the same twice in dreams, so if you can read a book, you're not dreaming. Likewise, surely they'd recognize a level at which they didn't have dream powers, like being able to leap across to the other apartment.

http://cheezcomixed.files.wordpress.com/2010/07/inceptionp1.jpg

Why on earth would you even contemplate going to see Inception if you turn off mentally when literature or TV or other films start dealing with dreams?!

Someone who felt Donnie Darko was evocative and emotionally engaging, but Inception wasn't is the opposite kind of film goer than me.

Also, ledge, you didn't recognize the being stuck in a tight alley while you're being pursued as a classic dream moment?

Because I thought I'd love it, and did. But it was much more like a thought exercise than any sort of oh-no-they're-in-peril-don't-die engagement xp

Being conscious of the weaknesses and traps of oft-tread subject matter doesn't you won't like every whack at it. I thought Chris Nolan made a pretty entertaining film about Guys In Tights Wrestling With Deep Thoughts despite the inherent absurdity of it.

doesn't mean you won't like every whack at it, rather. I'm probably going to see Devil even though Man Vs. Devil movies are guaranteed to be bullshit ridiculous on some level. That doesn't mean they can't have some thrills.

Also, ledge, you didn't recognize the being stuck in a tight alley while you're being pursued as a classic dream moment?

uh the silly thing ledge pointed out wasn't that he wasn't stuck in a tight alley, but that the actor clearly wasn't trying that hard to get through the space.

the second wasn't should be a was, sorry

it was an enjoyable thought excercise. Also Leo's scrunchy body is shaped like a 'v' from above making it appear like he wasn't turned sideways in the tight alley

another optical illusion!

seemed like leslie nielsen wrestling with a towel thrown in his face to me

and its not a big movie-capsizing deal or anything, just a lol

The actor wasn't trying hard enough to get through the space? You guys are silly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4bu4DF7ewo

again, just an action-movie-cliche lol, not a chink in the armor that needs defending

i loved that scene. since i've had a ton of sleep-paralysis inspired dreams like that. usually im trying to run to or away from something and can't. fucking. move.

i also had about a 3 month period where a sensation of falling would jolt me awake about 2-3 times a night.

I figured out why leos limbo is full of crumbly office buildings - they represent his teeth falling out

sometimes i think the whole dream angle is a bit of a red herring though. if anything, it's a shared virtual reality created by a particular subconscious. what's intriguing about that is that the movie suggests and such constructs are inherently unstable and uncontrollable. (ie, not even the virtual space of our own mind is under our control)

ie, that these virtual realities always threaten to become dreams...

turn off as soon as characters in other books or films start relating their dreams, and also in real life.

O T M

That's massively subjective though, and not a reason to call a film bad, merely a reason to avoid seeing a film, same as if you don't like films about dinosaurs or romance.

or teenagers

DO NOT SEE THIS MOVIE

Now I'm thinking about elephants.

I liked Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors better

That's massively subjective though, and not a reason to call a film bad, merely a reason to avoid seeing a film, same as if you don't like films about dinosaurs or romance.

Am not calling it *bad* for that reason, just having a stab at explaining why it's not very emotionally engaging.

It's in the same area as feeling cheated by an "it was all a dream" soap plot. You were invested, but it turned out the consequences you cared about didn't matter (in the context of the world you buy into).

Partly why Cillian's parts are more affecting: the consequences for him are real, they're trying to affect him in the real world; matters way more than kid-on-van-about-to-hit-kid-on-water.

sometimes a movie can be about ideas and concepts and not necessarily have to have characters you can relate to.

Soooo how was it that Cobb and Mal (?) only had to kill themselves by train in their limbo to get out?

I think we're getting limbo's rules confused with the regular dream states. the "kick", as explained by the chemist, was for the regular dream states, because killing yourself wouldn't wake you up, but the sensation of falling would since the sedative didn't affect the ears.

However, limbo was explained as raw subconscious activity. they never explained the rules for leaving limbo. They only explained that you could be stuck there for as long as 50 years or more. hence why Leo pulled the gun for Saito to presumably use on Cobb, then himself.

so presumably only the 'regular' rules applied

So limbo is dangerous because it is unpredictable? Its the easy ticket out if not. It'd make the kicks kind of pointless.

Also kind of dumb as pointed out somewhere above that the rolling van didn't wake them up when the chair tipping over did during the tests.

because it wasn't a free fall, whereas the chair tip was.

how many threads feature people arguing over an instruction manual?

how many threads feature people bitching about the same things over and over?

oh wait, a lot....

Just trying to get the movie, thats all.

I was a bit bummed that with all the portent and ambition, huge hunks of the movie still boiled down to people with machine guns firing at each other in pursuit of making a giant energy company less powerful. The B- James Bond snow stuff pretty much made me snicker. Appreciated a lot of it, regardless.

The thing is, in "Memento" all the narrative trickery plays perfectly into the narrative itself, with a sad, tragic result. Here, all the trickery, as such, largely amounts to sound and fury signifying nothing. Per that interview quote somewhere above, the most interesting way to think about the movie is as about an implied character that exists both before and after the movie (Cobb possibly being incepted, etc.), but agree with the actor/interview subject that Nolan is so literal minded he would never do anything that radical. I mean, I like "The Prestige" a lot, but almost because of its acute literal-mindedness, where the big reveal turns out to be impossible but you just sort of go with it. In this one, the rules and metaphysics are kept so loose they don't even matter, and the only guy you end up caring about at all is the guy the super team has been assembled to con.

Intrigued by the (again, unsupported) idea there may be multiple teams at work throughout the world, but again, the specifics are so vague. Like, what are Cobb's qualifications, exactly? What wisdom did (extraction inventor?) Michael Caine impart, and what made Cobb so (uniquely?) receptive to it? Is extraction a massive national security issue and, if so, is it in and of itself illegal? Etc. A prequel would be totally justified were this movie not already so focuses on circuitous exposition.

Evan -- comment was for Tape Store, not you. I apologize that I didn't make that clear!

Its OK! It was a response to him ultimately.

Another weird thing: how could a movie explicitly about the subconscious and dreaming be so totally sexless? I guess you can say it's just as explicitly about guilt and control, but still.

i have a theory about that

but meanwhile though i definitely <3'd this movie, i do think the snow fortress stuff was probably the biggest mistake. it was competent enough, but nothing more. if they'd made it zero-g, that would have been something.