Most people know Christopher Nolan’s name as the director behind the mega-hit Batman franchise of the past few years. You know, the one that made half a billion dollars and won Heath Ledger a posthumous Oscar for Best Supporting Actor? Despite his blockbuster success, Nolan’s personal pet projects are the ones that have amazed, mystified and baffled moviegoers since his 2001 film “Memento.” That film, along with “Insomnia” and “The Prestige,” were mind-bending, smartly crafted cinematic wonders that demanded repeated viewings and admiration for the man who could concoct them. Roaring into the current summer movie climate of sequels and underachievers, Nolan’s newest work, “Inception,” is no different.
If you have seen any of the promotional marketing for “Inception,” you know that the film’s public relations department was secretive to the point of confusion. Many were intrigued by the twisty visuals and the wide-ranging cast roster, but few knew the plot’s contents. So, what the heck is “Inception” about, exactly? The film is ⎯ at its heart ⎯ a heist movie, though there are no bank robberies and no hostages taken. Instead of plundering safes, the targets here are people’s minds ⎯ robbing them not of money, but of their free will when the mind is most vulnerable. The film follows Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio, in his second mind-bender this year), a man who performs corporate espionage with the help of some near-future biotechnology that allows him to enter the dream worlds of others. Usually, Cobb tries to steal ideas hidden in the recesses of a person’s mind, but when offered the chance to redeem his troubled past and return to his family, he assembles an elite team of mind hackers to perform “inception” ⎯ that is, enter the dream state and try to plant an idea instead.
Enigmatic, dense and visually intense are just a few words one would use to describe “Inception.” These sentiments are compounded by the fact that the concept of the film is complex and multi-faceted. This is a movie that equals “The Dark Knight” in length and requires the first hour of the film to set up the ground rules of the world you have just entered. Even though this paragraph may scare away half of those reading this article, I implore everyone to stick with the film ⎯ the back half of the movie pays off in spades.
Some have said that the story lacks pathos, that while we are on the edge of our seats with suspense, we don’t really care what happens to Cobb or any of the other players. They’d be right, to an extent, but when a story is this well done, sometimes you don’t need to be entirely emotionally invested in the characters to anticipate the story’s outcome.
The brilliance of the film emerges over the course of the inception job, as Cobb and his crew attempt to break up a conglomerate by planting seeds of doubt in an energy heir’s mind. To do this, the “architect” (Ellen Page) builds levels of dreams as if they were a video game, and the team must enter deeper and deeper levels of their target’s subconscious. Each level, however, operates under ever-expanding time constraints. If the first level of a dream spans 30 seconds, the next spans several hours, the next spans weeks, and the next spans years. By the time you get to the meat of the third act, Nolan is juggling so many narrative balls that the film is an impressive, exciting feat to watch.
Commercials have shown snippets of some of the amazing, mind-bending special effects, but they really are great to see on the big screen. Nolan was essentially given carte blanche on this production thanks to his Batman success, and spends his money on lavish action sequences, several trips around the globe and manipulations of time that perfectly complement the mechanics set up in the narrative. Yet, the visual interest that gets you to the cineplex is by no means the feature here. This is a story-driven movie with some excellent eye candy for good measure ⎯ the complete opposite of most summer movies.
With “Inception,” Christopher Nolan has crafted yet another unique world that demands repeat viewings to fully grasp what you just saw. The movie is a daring gamble: a self-contained amalgamation of psychological thriller, heist movie and action epic that makes you question what is real. Like the best of dreams, “Inception” may not make sense at times, but stays with you long after you’ve come to.