Inception (2010)

Before the review I just want to say that by far Inception seems to be my most favorite movie of the year...

Both the most challenging sci-fi movie since “The Matrix” — and perhaps the most uniquely told film since director Christopher Nolan’s own, stunning “Memento” — “Inception” is definitely not for the “A-Team” crowd.

Directed by Christopher Nolan. With Leonardo DiCaprio, Marion Cotillard, Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Now playing in New Jersey.

   There are plenty of explosions, sure, and fight scenes, and gadgetry. There’s Leonardo DiCaprio as the hero, Marion Cotillard as the femme fatale and enough globe-trotting locations to fuel two 007 films.

   But it also takes place in the mind — or, rather, in several minds at once, as our heroes pursue their prize through dreams within dreams. In fact, by the climax, the action is occurring in at least four separate and simultaneous realities.

   As in “Memento,” though, the fractured storytelling is not only in service of the story, it’s the only way to tell the story. Our hero Cobb, you see, is a thief of the subconscious — hired by corporations to slip into a business rival’s dreams and steal an idea.

Or, in this case, plant an idea.

   It’s a risky strategy, but then this is a risky film. Audiences have become used to being passive creatures, especially during the summer; “Inception” demands you pitch in, too. If you want to enjoy the movie, you have to be part of the team.

   It’s a great team, too, starting with DiCaprio. Over the past few years he’s played a variety of tortured characters. Unreliable narrators, they understand neither themselves nor the world around them.

   We have some help from Cotillard — who hasn’t given a bad performance yet, and turns in another great, heartbreaking one here. (Although Nolan is wrong to use Édith Piaf on the soundtrack; it feels like a cheap in-joke about Cotillard’s Oscar-winning turn in “La Vie en Rose.”)

   And there’s a fully realized supporting cast — from the ever-sly Joseph Gordon-Levitt, to “Batman Begins” grads Michael Caine and Cillian Murphy, to Ellen Page, thankfully leaving her slangy “Juno” persona behind to play a whip-smart architecture student.

   But mostly there’s Nolan, who uses a rich variety of references — from the mind-puzzling drawings of M.C. Escher to the “Am I a man who dreamt he was a butterfly, or a butterfly dreaming he is a man?” koans of Chinese philosophy — to drive this intricate game.

    It is a game, too. A few of the allusions (Page’s character is named after a Homeric heroine) turn out to be possibly deliberate dead ends. And the film’s ending — it doesn’t really conclude — is just ambiguous enough to leave you wondering.

“You create the world of the dream,” Cobb says early on, explaining how he does it. “You bring the subject into that dream, and they fill it with their secrets.” It’s a good clear description of how Cobb does what he does — getting inside our minds and tricking us into helping.
 
Rating...
10/10