Inception: When I’m in the middle of a dream…
My fingertips are rattling against the keyboard, there’s more red in my eyes than white and I can feel my kidneys shrinking as their neighbours, the adrenal glands struggle to push more of their go juice into my blood stream. It feels like I haven’t slept in days when in reality I’ve been in a dream for the last 2 and half hours.
The architect of that dream? Christopher Nolan. It’s title? Inception. His first film since The Dark Knight took a bigillion dollars in 2008 proves yet again that he is the smartest man in the room, and any other construct you care to put him in for that matter. To tell you too much of the plot would spoil the experience so my aim is to be as vague as possible, you’ll thank me later. Leonardo DiCaprio is Don Cobb a man who specialises in the extraction of information from people through their dreams. He assembles a team for ‘one last job’ including the likes of Ellen Page, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Ken Wattenabe; this is where the fun begins, with dreams within dreams and explosive action that defies the laws of physics.
Shifting timelines and playing with the structure of narrative is a familar device of Nolan’s seen in most of his films. Here it is played out to the ultimate effect, in the depths of someone’s subconscious A is never the quickest route to B if it or any other letters even exist anymore. Nolan combines a layered emotional story with literally mind-blowing visuals; perfectly syncing character and concept together to such a degree it becomes impossible to separate the two.
The typical approach of a summer event movie is to lead people by the hand with a pervading air of condescension, repeating important plot information loudly as if they were enquiring of a deaf elderly relative if they needed the loo. Here it’s up to you to do the leg work; it’s intelligent, challenging and intensely thought provoking and it expects you to be the same. You can almost hear the director shouting “Keep up I’ll be asking questions afterwards!” as your mind attempts to bend itself around the concepts and ideas. It’s not often you experience the pleasant feeling of warm brain matter dribbling out of your ears whilst watching a Hollywood film, it’s one of many things to cherish in this production.
All this cleverness is balanced out with the bang-for-your-buck you’d expect from a film at this time of year. While the story is a feast for the mind, the eyes have plenty to snack on with saliva-inducing visuals. Vast landscapes and cities that contort, grow and fold in on themselves, limited only by an individual’s imagination along with fight scenes played out during an ever shifting centre of gravity involving an armies’ worth of weaponry proving that Nolan doesn’t need a man dressed up as a bat to create excitement. You really haven’t seen anything like this before.
The real beauty is when you realise they aren’t in danger of overshadowing the characters as they are the very product of their subconscious and to that end an extention of their character. Leonardo DiCaprio’s Cobb holds the team together with strength and determination whilst struggling to keep the collapse of his world from affecting others; his emotional fragility is never overplayed and always believable. Joseph Gordon- Levitt and Tom Hardy are suitably hard as nails and provide the humour, whilst Marion Cotillard and Cillian Murphy…well that would be telling.
This weekend will see bars and restaurants across the land filled with post-match analysis about what it all means. Part of the joy of watching is looking forward to discussing it with others afterwards. The rich layered story providing room for multiple viewings and plenty to chew over for a long time to come. After all that excitement I think I’ll head off to bed, wonder what I’ll dream about…
