Review: Inception

This is it. The movie I'd been waiting all year to see. So far I've been amazed by director Christopher Nolan's work which includes Memento, Batman Begins, The Prestige, and The Dark Knight. Nolan always loves to play with the audiences' mind in regards to his twisting plots and the psychological themes and ideas therein. No one can craft a plot with such precision, intensity, and perfect pacing like he can. And Inception just takes the cake on that note.

I will do my best not to reveal anything about the plot or its ideas that may take away from the movie going experience. But I will tell you that it is one complex movie-going experience. I really can't recall a recent time when I was so thoroughly engrossed in a movie because not only are you trying to follow the intense and awesome action sequences on screen (and there are many), but you're also trying to keep track of the tricks of the trade of dream invasion.

After the beginning, the plot takes a bit of time explaining to the audience just how dream invasion works, what you can and can't do, what different things mean, and the multiple levels to dreams and who controls what. For me, all this information was almost a bit too much to handle with one sitting and definitely requires multiple viewings of the movie to get just exactly how all these "rules" play out in regards to the plot. And as for the plot, all you need to know is that Cobb (Leonardo Dicaprio) leads a team of dream experts comprised  of Eames (Tom Hardy), Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), Ariadne (Ellen Page), Saito (Ken Watanabe), and Yusuf (Dileep Rao). Each one of these characters has their own duties concerning dream invasion and what they control. In the same way, each one has a plot function that doesn't really give their character much depth.

That's not to say that they're not cool, but there's not much to them apart from Cobb. He's the real focus of the entire movie. Cobb's team gets an assignment for dream invasion and the consequences should they fail, but they really aren't the focus either. Of course, we want them to succeed and it's an entirely exhilarating, thrilling experience watching them trying to work it out filled with spectacular action sequences, including Arthur's gravity-defying battle with a few men in a hotel hallway. 

Most of these characters are also boiled down to what makes them entertaining. Joseph Gordon Levitt's Arthur is obviously there to look dashing and cool in his slicked back hair and fancy outfits, and he does. Tom Hardy's Eames (my favorite character) is totally rad and the action hero who performs some Call of Duty type heroics at one point, and Ellen Page's Ariadne is the noob to the dream team simply to provide a way for Nolan to explain to us how it all works because she asks questions. However, the true reason they're invading this certain person's dream is so Nolan can create a world with rules, scenarios, and ideas we've never seen before. The consequences aren't the focus, the absolute coolness of it all is which is definitely not bad. If this was a Michael Bay movie, that'd be a terrible thing, but thankfully, Nolan is an expert and knows exactly what he's doing.

Seriously, it's like nothing you'll experience in a movie for a long time. Anyone else with an idea like this who tried to make something just as complex would have failed and become lost in the complications of the "rules" and logistics. Nolan sticks to the rules, but he also breaks them and messes with us so much that by the end you're literally holding your breath. That may sound cliche just like the "edge of your seat" saying, but it really is true. For about the last hour of the 148 minutes running time everything is moving so fast, the music is constantly at a heightened, throbbing pace, and the dreams are getting more complex. 

I simply must see this again soon. I almost feel like I can't quite do it justice in this review having only seen it once. But that's all you really need to know at this point. It's truly like nothing you've seen before.