Comments on: Inception

By: Jordan

Jordan — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 03:47:32 +0000

Alex,

The movie pretty clearly states what an idea is and is not meant to delve deeper into it. But the movie does deal with the concept of reality but it’s not about “what is reality?” as you said. It’s about whether it matters if we’re in a reality or not. For Cobb, once he sees the faces of his children he knows that he will succumb to the dream and forget reality. And by the time it gets to the end of the movie, when he’s let go of the woman he loves, we are left wondering if Cobb is still dreaming. But does that really matter since it is still real to him? Is there more than one reality? If I believe it’s real does that make it so? That’s really where the movie is going on a philosophical level. There are other ideas in the movie but I think those were more a product of dealing with reality and not something Nolan was focused on.

By: Eric

Eric — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 14:25:56 +0000

“The film contradicted itself, making this reviewer’s point valid.

It says that changing the dream world too much, making it too mind-bending, will make the dreamer realize that they’re dreaming, which is bad. It also says that you only realize something was strange *after* you wake up. So which is it? If the former, then they were justified in grounding the visuals in reality. If the latter, they’ve creatively locked themselves in a box.”

It wasn’t a contradiction – the idea was that changing too much in the dream world will help the subconscious reality that there is a foreign entity in the dream. The architect – the person who is building the dream and has the power to change it – isn’t the dreamer, so the dreamer’s subconscious will turn on the architect if they get too crazy.

By: Alex

Alex — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 09:43:29 +0000

Given the internet’s response to Inception, I’m not surprised people are zipping on here to bash your review, but I thought your analysis spot-on. I really enjoyed Inception, but it was an entertaining blockbuster and nothing more. It took a huge number of potentially interesting intellectual and philosophical questions (what is an idea? where do ideas come from? what does it mean to create? what is ‘reality?’) and shoved them into a thriller/heist model, taking deep philosophical questions and–rather than grappling with them or offering anyu new insights–using them to make an action sequence with four timers counting down instead of just one.

Please, can everyone stop confusing “having a twist” with “being intellectually interesting?”

By: Zoe

Zoe — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 09:02:26 +0000

Oh, for the love of god. Has no one ever heard of Cartesian Doubt? It’s not like the intellectual world hasn’t been debating this for centuries; how do we know what is or isn’t real, and how can we separate dreams from reality? There’s even been an entire field of study devoted to this question: metaphysics.

For those unfamiliar with Cartesian Doubt, read Descartes “Meditations”. Though perhaps I should simply state the foundational premise of the film: cogito ergo sum. (That too is Descartes fundamental premise).

By: Dave

Dave — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 05:55:51 +0000

Your subconcious notices the change which would escape regular awareness. Thus changing the dream is possible but doing so puts at risk everything you’re doing in the dream. Very clearly explained in the movie.

Regardless the movie seems to be written in such a way that it really is only as complex as the viewer wants it. I actually thought it was really cool that these big ideas the movie alluded to were left open. But leo’s character arc dealt with the idea of true reality pretty objectively. Fantastic mix of popcorn flick and cerebral cinema.

By: Kate

Kate — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 23:03:37 +0000

The film contradicted itself, making this reviewer’s point valid.

By: Jesus

Jesus — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 18:05:12 +0000

Wow. This review is the result of an intellectually arrogant person spending way too much time breaking down a film, not based on what the film offered, but on what he insists were meanings within the film. Using the grandiose approach of naming other films to imply that he must know what he’s talking about since he can rattle off all these other movies. None of the movies mentioned had anything to do with “Inception” except on a visual level. “Oceans Eleven”? Seriously? Why because of group of people wanted to steal something from someone else? You really liked the movie so much after you saw it that you wanted to see it again. But…after letting your ego take hold – and your need to write a review – you decided to break it down for us less ed-ja-macated types, eh? Comparing it to “The Matrix” because people seemed to have god like powers in their dreams? Uh. Hello? It’s a dream. Dreams have no boundaries, because their cerebral constructs not constrained by the physical world. You would be more convincing if you could write a screenplay that sells, then simply taking someone else’s hard work and dissecting it with your less than compelling views.

By: Phil

Phil — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 05:31:54 +0000

In your review, you often brought up how it was similar to other movies (i.e., where its plot and/or concepts overlap with those of past movies) as if that were a pitfall. Do you do this in all your reviews? If so, I think you must find it incredibly difficult to write a complimentary review, as the idea of writing is by no means new to humanity. It’s a basic understanding of writing that what you’re writing has probably been written before, but often not the exact the same. Moviemaking offers even more differentiation, conceptually similarity notwithstanding, in that visual appearance will almost always differ drastically. You hold it against the movie, in your closing paragraph, that it was not a “ground-breaking masterpiece”. It seems ridiculous to demand that all movies must be “ground-breaking” to earn a even near-decent review. I can almost guarantee you that “Dark City”, despite my not having seen it, was not the first concept ever written concerning dreams and reality in contrast. It seems the only real problem with this movie, in your opinion, was that it was similar to other movies.

By: Nick

Nick — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 21:36:18 +0000

I couldn’t agree more with Karol. I was about to say that as well. Perhaps it would have been cool to see more dream-bending, but it certainly was explained early on why they might not do that.

By: karol

karol — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 20:12:20 +0000

It is stated early in the film that the more you change the more dangerous the enviroment will become. Also the person who is the subject might realize he/she is dreaming. And the dream would collapse. So the team would end up in limbo in the process. That’s why they choose to dream of only more grounded possibilities (like guns etc). That’s how I see it.