INCEPTION By Gary Murray Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page Ken Watanabe and Marion Cotillard Written and directed by Christopher Nolan Running time 2 hr 15 min MPAA Rating PG-13 Selig Film Scale: FULL PRICE Christopher Nolan reinvented the Batman franchise with Batman Begins, taking a series that had gone into parody and making it cool again. The re-boot generated a new enthusiasm for re-booting comic book films that still reverberates today. He takes on the idea of dream warriors with Inception, one of the most creative films of the summer. The film stars Leonardo DiCaprio is Cobb, a skilled thief in the art of extraction. His job is to go into the mind of his victim and extract information during the dream state, stealing ideas from others. As the drama opens, Cobb and his team are demonstrating their skills to Saito (Ken Watanabe) a prospective client. Even though the extraction doesn't go as planned, Saito is impressed by the team and wants to hire them. Cobb has problems of his own. In his dreams, he is haunted by the image of his dead wife Mal (Marion Cotillard). He cannot seem to let go of his love for her and she is the image that wrecks his inner memory. The newest member of the team Ariade (Ellen Page) senses that something is not quite right with her new boss, but is so intrigued by all the possibilities of working in dreams that she checks her questioning before the others. Her job is to architect the dream, like a maze designer, so Cobb can function more like he would in a real dream, making it seem more like a reality to the victim. Saito wants the Cobb team to go into the dreams of his competitor in order to gain business leverage. Saito offers Cobb something more than money, a way to get back to the US and his children, the only line he still has with Mal. It seems that Cobb is suspected of having something to do with Mal's death. Wanting Cobb to implant an idea into the brain of his competitor Robert Fischer Jr. (Cillian Murphy), Saito shows that he will go to any means to win in business. Everyone on the team thinks that placing an idea into an attacked subject cannot be done, everyone except Cobb. His idea is to create different levels of unconsciousness, a dream within a dream within a dream, in order to make Robert think that the implanted idea is his own. If this explanation seems confusing, it is much clearer in the film. The adventure of Inception happens when the team goes inside the mind of Fischer. Visually this is one of the most stunning films of the year. It gives us a magnificent world of dreams to work with–buildings folding on top of buildings and almost dead motion. We get mind explosions that seem real to everyone except the people who are controlling the dream. Shocking someone out of a dream by dunking them becomes a Titanic style flood. The dream collapsing is truly memorable. Each frame if filled to the brim with images that captivate, drawing one into the story. The film takes on some heady concepts like what is truly reality and how one can lose the grasp on what is truly real. It is about how positive emotions trump negative emotions and how one must go downward in a dream to move forward. It is a complicated story that will probably lose many along the way. The concept of how the inner dream takes on a longer life than the first dream is used to a very cinematic exposition. It I had to describe this film I'd call it a mash-up of Total Recall, Eternal Sunshine of the Spottless Mind, Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors and Dream scape while at the same time is is nothing that one has ever seen before. Leonardo delivers one of his best performances in years, truly redeeming himself from the mess of Shutter Island. Here we get the same kind of pathos but in a more believable form, even in his REM state. He takes us on a very confusing journey but never attempts to pander. This is a role that he will be remembered with until the end of his career. The lovely Ellen Page looks wonderfully lost as the newcomer. Her awe inspired looks mirror ours, she is just as much a traveler in this world as the audience. I loved Marion Cotillard as Mal, the dead wife. She has the hardest role of the piece, being the image of a real person while being a real person in flashbacks. She walks a confusing path with a definite aplomb. The great Michael Caine shows up in a great little cameo as grandfather.. Inception is a film that will be watched over and over by movie freaks and those who want to catch filmmakers in mistakes. Christopher Nolan has built a film world that will be a point of debate and contention for film fans for years. Geeks will analyze the images of Inception looking for deeper meaning in the cinematic subtext. It is a sprawling mind epic that will captivate legions of film fans. While not for everyone, it is the kind of film that will generate contention and discussion, which is a nice diversion from all the pablum delivered on the Summer Silver Screen.
