Also figured out the ending pretty early on, but still enjoyed watching the whole thing.
Trying to keep this thread spoiler-free for now
when that final shot went dark
Hey what the fuck man.
huh?
Saying dude, why did you have to spoiler the ending where the last shot then goes to black for the credits. I mean, that only happens on EVERY FILM, so why'd you have to ruin it for those who haven't seen it?
Just saw it this afternoon. I really liked it though I agree about seeing the ending pretty early on. I had the same feeling at the beginning of "Shutter Island." Although the screen does, ahem, "go blank" I think my preconceptions played into how I feel the movie ended.
The zero gravity fights were the best without a doubt and I still have no idea how they filmed that. Either the CGI is insane or the 3rd Rock kid has ups.
Spoilers (maybe): To address the lack of severity in the dream fights, I think that the idea of spending the next 50 dream years in Leo's limbo and essentially losing their minds after waking up was enough to make you worry about the characters. Sounds like I'm alone on this one though. The bad guys being "projections of the subconscious" was a little hard to swallow though.
Spoilers (maybe): To address the lack of severity in the dream fights, I think that the idea of spending the next 50 dream years in Leo's limbo and essentially losing their minds after waking up was enough to make you worry about the characters. Sounds like I'm alone on this one though.
No, you are not alone. I thought the threat of "limbo" and loss of brain function was enough.
I still don't get this whole "I figured out the ending" bit though. There IS no ending, so how did you "figure it out???"
I still don't get this whole "I figured out the ending" bit though. There IS no ending, so how did you "figure it out???"
Once I found out that Leo was a troubled soul that had been dealing with dreams I figured that the issue would be whether or not he was still in a dream. I guess to say "I had it figured out" is a little unfair but I saw the last scene coming from about the 30 minute mark.
Also would like to point out that the Japanese did it first, and better.
oh no they deehin'
I'm not going to watch it anytime soon then. too much hype
I loved that Paprika anime. Watched it like 4 years ago and it reminded me of Matrix too. It was a mind bending experience.
changed my life ! /Stan Winters
1) I had no problem with the fights in the dreams. Remember early on they said that your brain fights against intruders and as people stay longer it could get more aggressive like white blood cells, so if you got training you could actually turn these into persistent attacks.
2) Like others I thought limbo was god enough. Do you want to turn out to be a vegetable sitting in a bed for the rest of your life? That was a fine enough motivation for me.
I still don't get this whole "I figured out the ending" bit though. There IS no ending, so how did you "figure it out???"
Once I found out that Leo was a troubled soul that had been dealing with dreams I figured that the issue would be whether or not he was still in a dream. I guess to say "I had it figured out" is a little unfair but I saw the last scene coming from about the 30 minute mark.
Without trying to give spoilers I figured out that Leo would be with who he was with at the end, and that they would imply that it was another level pretty early on in the film.
If you believe he is still in a dream at the end, then you either believe
A. The whole thing was a dream. Which doesn't make sense because even with the whole time change things at some point he's been asleep in the real world for too long and would die from starvation or is in a hospital in a coma being kept alive by machines and that's just reading way too much into it on your own
or
B. He didn't actually wake up on the 747 at the end of the flight, in which case he still would have to wake up some time or be in a coma. Even then he was under a drug that was suppose to wear off or still wake up with the kick, so if he didn't die in the dream the he should have woken up. Plus him not waking up would cause a noticeable issue on the plane for the mark and likely undo the thought plant. I mean really the fact that the mark was trained to fight off mind invasion and didn't think anything of the entire first class being active in his dream is a big enough hole already. You could argue he was a rich snob pre-occupied with his fathers death, but there was no way you didn't notice the faces in such a small cabin even if you were drugged right away. You still have to get off the plane with those people.
The ending was just to screw with people and get a groan from the audience. The job was a success and Leo is back with his kids. If you really believe that he was still dreaming at the end, then this movie is so full of holes I don't like it anymore. LOL!
I enjoyed this movie, though it wasn't the mind fusk I thought it was going to be. There were some holes, but so what just have fun. It had to be over explained because it was a pretty original idea that you can't really expect people just to figure out. I know, other people have done similar things but this movie had specific rules that had to be explained.
I think that's debatable. I don't think the amount of detail here really made the film suffer so I'm in agreement with you here. But I also don't think a good storyteller ever has to explain shit if they know how to tell a story right. "Inception" was anal-retentively detailed in a way that wasn't necessary but, to me, didn't necessarily detract from its entertainment value. I'm sympathetic to others who disagree.
volumen said:
As far as the "nobody in danger" who cares? A movie isn't good unless every dies if they fail?
That's not what I was saying. But if you're in a situation where you're killing "projections" and the worst thing that happens to you is you either "wake up" or "go to limbo," there's no dramatic tension in the stakes. I mean, Cobb took on a job that he knew would be difficult and unpopular because he wanted to "get back home" and the film hammers the point home that this is VERY IMPORTANT (cue: Zimmer!). If it had been about getting paid, it would have changed the tenor of the film.
So yeah, when you have Eames going all fucking Jason Bourne/Rambo on the snow bunnies, the fact that he's basically killing a bunch of mental projections is about as exciting as watching someone else play a video game. There's very little narrative drama there.
To me, I'm surprised Nolan didn't take the opportunity to create a more sophisticated "extraction defense." I mean, having a bunch of armed dudes show up and wreck shop seems pretty, well, lame compared to - for example - deploying forgers like Eames against the extraction/inception team. Instead, you reduce the game to a series of "who can kill who faster?"
.
I still think going to limbo was enough dramatic tension. Especially because by the end you realize what the fist scene was so who wants to end up like that. For Cobb the tension was limbo or life in jail, that's a bit to worry about and for everyone else it was limbo which looked to suck pretty bad. But I do agree that they didn't need to show endless battles with projections when they aren't real and apparently very easy to defeat!
I do agree that they didn't need to show endless battles with projections when they aren't real and apparently very easy to defeat!
yeah, this is what the problem is. Nolan just isn't a gifted action director and that's fine except that he keeps insisting on filling his movies with bad fight sequences.
It's been often said that Nolan seems to aspire to make high-minded popcorn films and god bless him for that (since someone needs to counteract Bay and Ratner) but his work is so "serious" and "stoic" that it's a drag after a while. I mean, he was the perfect guy to take on "Batman" but imagine his craftsmanship combined with, you know, a sense of humor.
This is a fair criticism of his earlier stuff but Inception had some genuinely hilarious moments.
That was an excellent overview of the film. This brings up a point that I couldn't really articulate well.
"The unconscious, as Freud (and Hitchcock, and a lot of other great filmmakers) knew, is a supremely unruly place, a maze of inadmissible desires, scrambled secrets, jokes and fears. "
I felt that Christopher Nolan's take on the Dreamworld was too logical and coherent. With a film delving into the subconscious mind I was expecting something a bit more abstract (something that I feel Gondry understands VERY well). Especially how you're jumping into the minds of other Dreamers, I was expecting a drastic difference in imagery and tone (something that is mentioned by Marion Cotillard's character early in the film).
mannybolone said:
So yeah, when you have Eames going all fucking Jason Bourne/Rambo on the snow bunnies, the fact that he's basically killing a bunch of mental projections is about as exciting as watching someone else play a video game. There's very little narrative drama there.
Exactly. It's hard to care about an action sequence when you know that the character isn't really risking anything.
Don't mean to go off on a tangent here, but this reminds me of a conversation I just had with my Cousin. I was playing Assasin's creeed 2 jumping off of rooftops, literally falling to my death while playing a silly in-game Carnival chase. He asked me how many lives do I have? I explained to him that there isn't really lives in this type of game. It's not like Pac-man when we were kids where the point of the game was to advance as far as possible before you die. Where you only have 50 cents at the arcade and you want your game to last as long as possible. The stakes are different. It really doesn't matter how many times you die. There is no risk.
It's been often said that Nolan seems to aspire to make high-minded popcorn films and god bless him for that (since someone needs to counteract Bay and Ratner) but his work is so "serious" and "stoic" that it's a drag after a while. I mean, he was the perfect guy to take on "Batman" but imagine his craftsmanship combined with, you know, a sense of humor.
This is a fair criticism of his earlier stuff but Inception had some genuinely hilarious moments.
Like what? I think there were some good moments of levity: Eames' had a droll sense of humor, there was Ariadne's "wait, we're diving into which subconsciousness?" line and when Arthur tricked Ariadne into kissing him, that got a laugh too.
None of that remotely qualifies as "genuinely hilarious". "Genuinely hilarious" is where you can't stop laughing, even when you try. "Inception" inspired nothing remotely approaching that.
Look - I don't want Nolan to make a comedy. But as some reviewers have suggested, he makes films like he's got a big stick up his ass. Compare him with some of his better contemporaries and he's arguably the most self-serious of all of them. I'd rather him be that than some ass-clown like Ratner though.
It's been often said that Nolan seems to aspire to make high-minded popcorn films and god bless him for that (since someone needs to counteract Bay and Ratner) but his work is so "serious" and "stoic" that it's a drag after a while. I mean, he was the perfect guy to take on "Batman" but imagine his craftsmanship combined with, you know, a sense of humor.
This is a fair criticism of his earlier stuff but Inception had some genuinely hilarious moments.
agreed, i laughed out loud a handful of times, the theatre did as well.
loved the film, thought everything was clear by the end.
my only issue.. the scene where the "shapeshifter" character pulls out the grenade launcher in the first layer, how did that get there? if he thought ahead enough to bring in the grenade launcher, why not get an armored truck or something? i just found that odd.
More to the point, Ariadne demonstrated that you can change a dream on the fly, including the landscape and its physics or whatever else. Doesn't make sense that the dreamworld has to play by any set rules if you want to alter the reality. The chemist made it rain for example. Why not also create a more bulletproof van?
They said the more you change things the more the brain resists and then you get attacked and the dream eventually falls apart.
But it was his own dream, wasn't it? He was "the dreamer" for that level. Ergo, if it was his subconscious filling his own dream, if he opted to change things up, why would his own dream creations (i.e. the people populating said world) attack himself? Shit, Cobb brought a frickin' freight train into downtown L.A.! That's bound to attract some attention.
All I know is that Eames' level would have been much cooler if he retaliated against the Cobra snow troops by dreaming up that snow monster from "Empire Strikes Back." Don't front, you know I'm right.
Actually, serious question: if Ariadne designed the snow fortress level and Eames was the actual dreamer, how did Fischer's subconsciousness soldiers manage to figure out how to occupy the fortress? Shouldn't it have been the other way around, with his troops as the invaders and Cobb's crew as the defender?
They said the more you change things the more the brain resists and then you get attacked and the dream eventually falls apart.
But it was his own dream, wasn't it? He was "the dreamer" for that level. Ergo, if it was his subconscious filling his own dream, if he opted to change things up, why would his own dream creations (i.e. the people populating said world) attack himself? Shit, Cobb brought a frickin' freight train into downtown L.A.! That's bound to attract some attention.
All I know is that Eames' level would have been much cooler if he retaliated against the Cobra snow troops by dreaming up that snow monster from "Empire Strikes Back." Don't front, you know I'm right.
Actually, serious question: if Ariadne designed the snow fortress level and Eames was the actual dreamer, how did Fischer's subconsciousness soldiers manage to figure out how to occupy the fortress? Shouldn't it have been the other way around, with his troops as the invaders and Cobb's crew as the defender?
i was under the impression eames wasn't the actual dreamer for that level. at that point, it was fischer's projection of browning, so it was really fischer's dream
No, it was Eames' dream. Fischer thought he was entering into the dream of Beringer's character (whom Eames was "forging") but it was never Fischer's dream. Yet his subconsciousness managed to populate the dreamscape with his minions. Which doesn't really hold up to the logic the film itself has explained. But whatever. Guns! Explosions! Woohoo!
No, it was Eames' dream. Fischer thought he was entering into the dream of Beringer's character (whom Eames was "forging") but it was never Fischer's dream. Yet his subconsciousness managed to populate the dreamscape with his minions. Which doesn't really hold up to the logic the film itself has explained. But whatever. Guns! Explosions! Woohoo!
how does this work with the mistaken identity scene where browning comes around the corner, watanabe thinks its eames, then eames comes around the corner? i'm not following.
But it was his own dream, wasn't it? He was "the dreamer" for that level. Ergo, if it was his subconscious filling his own dream, if he opted to change things up, why would his own dream creations (i.e. the people populating said world) attack himself? Shit, Cobb brought a frickin' freight train into downtown L.A.! That's bound to attract some attention.
But the train was created by Cobb's subconscious truly, without his control - he wasn't changing things with intent, which could have made a difference, although I don't remember a distinction being mentioned.
Also, the projections-as-soldiers aspect can be explained away by the fact that they are specific creations of a security firm, placed there through training/suggestion/whatever as was mentioned repeatedly in the film, so it makes sense within that context that you would be facing an "armed attack" - why either side couldn't just "imagine better weapons" is a valid point that falls under narrative allowances, I guess.
I'll spare everyone quoting nine posts, but having just seen this, I thought it was tremendous. But I stand by my early post, and quote O-Dub, to say that Nolan makes movies "with a rod up his ass." "Tortured," is the word O-Dub used, and it is spot-on.
I think the idea that any moments were "genuinely hilarious," is overstatement by half, as at most there were a couple chuckles. I think, though, the bigger issue is that the tone of his movies is always so HEAVY that it borders on leaden. It's just so arch at times that it threatens to fall apart, or become totally cartoonish in it's seriousness.
Anyway, that is just my attempt to address my earlier stated concern, and basically, to point out that it remains Nolan's biggest flaw in my eyes.
As for other stuff in this thread, I thought the stakes were plenty high- both for Cobb (getting home, familial resolution) and the others (erasing your mind? yes, that is bad...). Visually, it was one of the coolest movies I've ever seen, and every critic that said that the editor deserves the Oscar is spot on.
And, while I think the Matrix is a tremendous movie, and I think this movie and the Ellen-Page-Exposition-Machine at the beginning (and, the training dreams) were very similar to the storytelling of the Matrix, I hope this movie ages better. I think the acting was better, for one (not saying much) but, also, by basing the movie in our minds and not in a computer, I think that Inception used the concept of, "is this reality?" in a way that is more universal than, "we've been taken over by machines!"
One thing I will add, and this is separate and ignorable for "thread derailment," purposes:
While I think this is comparable to The Matrix, and I stand by the fact that my initial impression is that this will age better... The Matrix is hard to judge at this point, as to me, it is every example of the sequel gone wrong.
Horribly. Horribly. HORRIBLY. Wrong.
It is really hard to judge that movie without considering the fact that it was merely the prologue to a terrible story, one that I definitely didn't bother finishing (as in, didn't watch the last 30 mins of the last movie). Part II was the most disappointed I've ever been in a movie theater, and something I retroactively hold against the first installment.
Comments
Saying dude, why did you have to spoiler the ending where the last shot then goes to black for the credits. I mean, that only happens on EVERY FILM, so why'd you have to ruin it for those who haven't seen it?
A**hole.
The poster art looks much more promising than the actual movie trailer.
The zero gravity fights were the best without a doubt and I still have no idea how they filmed that. Either the CGI is insane or the 3rd Rock kid has ups.
Spoilers (maybe): To address the lack of severity in the dream fights, I think that the idea of spending the next 50 dream years in Leo's limbo and essentially losing their minds after waking up was enough to make you worry about the characters. Sounds like I'm alone on this one though. The bad guys being "projections of the subconscious" was a little hard to swallow though.
*COUGH* +25 years ago...
This fan one is kinda kewl as well.
No, you are not alone. I thought the threat of "limbo" and loss of brain function was enough.
I still don't get this whole "I figured out the ending" bit though. There IS no ending, so how did you "figure it out???"
Once I found out that Leo was a troubled soul that had been dealing with dreams I figured that the issue would be whether or not he was still in a dream. I guess to say "I had it figured out" is a little unfair but I saw the last scene coming from about the 30 minute mark.
I'm not going to watch it anytime soon then. too much hype
I loved that Paprika anime. Watched it like 4 years ago and it reminded me of Matrix too. It was a mind bending experience.
changed my life ! /Stan Winters
2) Like others I thought limbo was god enough. Do you want to turn out to be a vegetable sitting in a bed for the rest of your life? That was a fine enough motivation for me.
Without trying to give spoilers I figured out that Leo would be with who he was with at the end, and that they would imply that it was another level pretty early on in the film.
If you believe he is still in a dream at the end, then you either believe
A. The whole thing was a dream. Which doesn't make sense because even with the whole time change things at some point he's been asleep in the real world for too long and would die from starvation or is in a hospital in a coma being kept alive by machines and that's just reading way too much into it on your own
or
B. He didn't actually wake up on the 747 at the end of the flight, in which case he still would have to wake up some time or be in a coma. Even then he was under a drug that was suppose to wear off or still wake up with the kick, so if he didn't die in the dream the he should have woken up. Plus him not waking up would cause a noticeable issue on the plane for the mark and likely undo the thought plant. I mean really the fact that the mark was trained to fight off mind invasion and didn't think anything of the entire first class being active in his dream is a big enough hole already. You could argue he was a rich snob pre-occupied with his fathers death, but there was no way you didn't notice the faces in such a small cabin even if you were drugged right away. You still have to get off the plane with those people.
The ending was just to screw with people and get a groan from the audience. The job was a success and Leo is back with his kids. If you really believe that he was still dreaming at the end, then this movie is so full of holes I don't like it anymore. LOL!
I still think going to limbo was enough dramatic tension. Especially because by the end you realize what the fist scene was so who wants to end up like that. For Cobb the tension was limbo or life in jail, that's a bit to worry about and for everyone else it was limbo which looked to suck pretty bad. But I do agree that they didn't need to show endless battles with projections when they aren't real and apparently very easy to defeat!
yeah, this is what the problem is. Nolan just isn't a gifted action director and that's fine except that he keeps insisting on filling his movies with bad fight sequences.
This is a fair criticism of his earlier stuff but Inception had some genuinely hilarious moments.
That was an excellent overview of the film. This brings up a point that I couldn't really articulate well.
"The unconscious, as Freud (and Hitchcock, and a lot of other great filmmakers) knew, is a supremely unruly place, a maze of inadmissible desires, scrambled secrets, jokes and fears. "
I felt that Christopher Nolan's take on the Dreamworld was too logical and coherent. With a film delving into the subconscious mind I was expecting something a bit more abstract (something that I feel Gondry understands VERY well). Especially how you're jumping into the minds of other Dreamers, I was expecting a drastic difference in imagery and tone (something that is mentioned by Marion Cotillard's character early in the film).
Exactly. It's hard to care about an action sequence when you know that the character isn't really risking anything.
Don't mean to go off on a tangent here, but this reminds me of a conversation I just had with my Cousin. I was playing Assasin's creeed 2 jumping off of rooftops, literally falling to my death while playing a silly in-game Carnival chase. He asked me how many lives do I have? I explained to him that there isn't really lives in this type of game. It's not like Pac-man when we were kids where the point of the game was to advance as far as possible before you die. Where you only have 50 cents at the arcade and you want your game to last as long as possible. The stakes are different. It really doesn't matter how many times you die. There is no risk.
- spidey
Like what? I think there were some good moments of levity: Eames' had a droll sense of humor, there was Ariadne's "wait, we're diving into which subconsciousness?" line and when Arthur tricked Ariadne into kissing him, that got a laugh too.
None of that remotely qualifies as "genuinely hilarious". "Genuinely hilarious" is where you can't stop laughing, even when you try. "Inception" inspired nothing remotely approaching that.
Look - I don't want Nolan to make a comedy. But as some reviewers have suggested, he makes films like he's got a big stick up his ass. Compare him with some of his better contemporaries and he's arguably the most self-serious of all of them. I'd rather him be that than some ass-clown like Ratner though.
hitchcock-ian?
agreed, i laughed out loud a handful of times, the theatre did as well.
loved the film, thought everything was clear by the end.
my only issue.. the scene where the "shapeshifter" character pulls out the grenade launcher in the first layer, how did that get there? if he thought ahead enough to bring in the grenade launcher, why not get an armored truck or something? i just found that odd.
valid point. i just would have went with the bullet proof van before the grenade launcher. tit for tat.
But it was his own dream, wasn't it? He was "the dreamer" for that level. Ergo, if it was his subconscious filling his own dream, if he opted to change things up, why would his own dream creations (i.e. the people populating said world) attack himself? Shit, Cobb brought a frickin' freight train into downtown L.A.! That's bound to attract some attention.
All I know is that Eames' level would have been much cooler if he retaliated against the Cobra snow troops by dreaming up that snow monster from "Empire Strikes Back." Don't front, you know I'm right.
Actually, serious question: if Ariadne designed the snow fortress level and Eames was the actual dreamer, how did Fischer's subconsciousness soldiers manage to figure out how to occupy the fortress? Shouldn't it have been the other way around, with his troops as the invaders and Cobb's crew as the defender?
i was under the impression eames wasn't the actual dreamer for that level. at that point, it was fischer's projection of browning, so it was really fischer's dream
how does this work with the mistaken identity scene where browning comes around the corner, watanabe thinks its eames, then eames comes around the corner? i'm not following.
But the train was created by Cobb's subconscious truly, without his control - he wasn't changing things with intent, which could have made a difference, although I don't remember a distinction being mentioned.
Also, the projections-as-soldiers aspect can be explained away by the fact that they are specific creations of a security firm, placed there through training/suggestion/whatever as was mentioned repeatedly in the film, so it makes sense within that context that you would be facing an "armed attack" - why either side couldn't just "imagine better weapons" is a valid point that falls under narrative allowances, I guess.
I think the idea that any moments were "genuinely hilarious," is overstatement by half, as at most there were a couple chuckles. I think, though, the bigger issue is that the tone of his movies is always so HEAVY that it borders on leaden. It's just so arch at times that it threatens to fall apart, or become totally cartoonish in it's seriousness.
Anyway, that is just my attempt to address my earlier stated concern, and basically, to point out that it remains Nolan's biggest flaw in my eyes.
As for other stuff in this thread, I thought the stakes were plenty high- both for Cobb (getting home, familial resolution) and the others (erasing your mind? yes, that is bad...). Visually, it was one of the coolest movies I've ever seen, and every critic that said that the editor deserves the Oscar is spot on.
And, while I think the Matrix is a tremendous movie, and I think this movie and the Ellen-Page-Exposition-Machine at the beginning (and, the training dreams) were very similar to the storytelling of the Matrix, I hope this movie ages better. I think the acting was better, for one (not saying much) but, also, by basing the movie in our minds and not in a computer, I think that Inception used the concept of, "is this reality?" in a way that is more universal than, "we've been taken over by machines!"
Loved it. Great movie.
While I think this is comparable to The Matrix, and I stand by the fact that my initial impression is that this will age better... The Matrix is hard to judge at this point, as to me, it is every example of the sequel gone wrong.
Horribly. Horribly. HORRIBLY. Wrong.
It is really hard to judge that movie without considering the fact that it was merely the prologue to a terrible story, one that I definitely didn't bother finishing (as in, didn't watch the last 30 mins of the last movie). Part II was the most disappointed I've ever been in a movie theater, and something I retroactively hold against the first installment.
My take? Inception? DON'T MAKE A SEQUEL!