[Stiva]

Pman usually writes the movie reviews around here and I'm sure he'll have better insights to offer than these, but I'll take a crack at it anyway.

I really enjoyed it, though it wasn't what I was expecting. The marketing has basically been "The Matrix as heist flick", but it turned out to be much more cerebral and intricate than that would suggest. A better comparison is Shutter Island, another inventive take on the dangers and opportunities of altered states of consciousness (it also shares so many incidental details that I'm sure there are magazine articles listing them somewhere; the two would make a great double feature). Like that film, Inception works well just as a twisty, entertaining, visually creative spectacle, but also piles on so many layers of meta-significance and looping allegory while remaining coherent that half the fun is reflecting on it after the fact and realizing just how much care and craftsmanship went into it (Hell, the concept of having multiple layers of significance is itself integral to the whole structure of the plot). It seems like it would hold up well on multiple viewings, even after you know all the twists and turns. In fact, even that would probably necessitate seeing it more than once.

Whereas The Matrix arbitrarily shoehorned kung fu and gun fu into its computer-program fantasy world purely for the action scenes, the dream worlds of Inception have an immediately recognizable internal logic of their own, which Nolan uses organically to create spectacular and memorable sequences (I imagine the iconic rotating hallway fight will go down as one of the all-time great action setpieces). For example, a dream is affected by the real-world physical momentum of the dreamer, something anyone who has ever slept in a moving vehicle will readily understand. Music played in the real world finds its way into the dream. Making the dreamer aware that they're dreaming destabilizes the whole thing, unless the person is practiced at keeping it together, paralleling the real-world phenomenon of lucid dreaming, which despite its unfortunate New Age associations is scientifically well documented. Without going into too much detail about the idea-heist itself, the film does a great job of plausibly explaining why it's so difficult, and then showing how the protagonists cleverly anticipate and counter each obstacle. I defy anyone to walk out of this without feeling just the slightest disorientation as to whether they're really awake or not. It's that well done.

The large cast of Nolan regulars does solid work overall though Leo gets so much screen time and the pace is so intense they don't have much time to flesh out deep characters. DiCaprio plays his usual feverishly driven, hard-boiled professional (as seen in Shutter Island, The Departed, The Aviator, etc. etc.) and while I'm not his biggest fan I have no complaints with him here. The standouts for me were Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Leo's smooth-talking iceman partner, and Marion Cotillard as his unhinged femme-fatale wife. Ellen Page gets saddled with a role that sometimes seems like little more than a plot device, but as I said it's really Leo's show so any such complaints are minor at best. And of course it's always nice to see a major Hollywood film in which the male leads wear tailored 3-piece suits instead of t-shirts and cargo shorts. Christopher Nolan must read Udolpho.

Anyway, considering how the choice of films so often comes down to disposable eye candy or Serious Art Films about the plight of persecuted gays, it's welcome to see something so thoughtful be so entertaining. Here's hoping Nolan gets more chances to do original stories and that he enjoys a long and prolific career.

[PLEASUREMAN]

After complaining about critical conformity in the last Armond White thread, it's fun to point out that Inception scores much lower than spoonfed fare like Toy Story 3 (99%) and The Kids Are All Right (95%), but then again so do alot of much worse movies. A backlash has set in for Inception after the saturated marketing campaign and early critical praise, with critics partly divided over the film's merits and hype-worthiness. Reactions are of course standard for the film critic set, with vague words like "clunky" or "intoxicating" deployed in lieu of real criticism. (In what seems like an impossibly dumb review, Rex Reed declares that "nobody can figure out" the story.)

I found Armond White's review interesting as usual, although he pans the movie.

Armond White:

“I am the most skilled extractor,” Cobb announces. “I know your mind better than your wife or therapist.” Mindfuck—Nolan’s specialty—is a perfect conman’s scheme that involves undermining a mark’s confidence. As Cobb’s dream warriors battle inside one industrialist’s head and then another’s, Nolan’s narrative—essentially a tale of corporate intrigue—goes from reality to dreams, then dreams within dreams. Its essential con is that, as in Memento, Nolan ignores the morality of his characters’ actions; he accepts that they will do anything—which is the cynicism critics admired in Memento, the con-man’s motivating nihilism.

Stuck in film-noir mode, Nolan’s dark sentimentality may seem classical to naive filmwatchers. But the way his clichés manipulate viewers’ perception of the world and human behavior is merely timely, not profound. Like Grand Theft Auto’s quasi-cinematic extension of noir and action-flick plots, Inception manipulates the digital audience’s delectation for relentless subterfuge. Cobb never runs into paradisaical visions like What Dreams May Come—only terror, danger and violence. Nolan’s F/X set pieces are all large-scale fight scenes, like Gordon-Levitt levitating/grappling with anonymous henchmen or Page and DiCaprio observing various apocalyptic destruction scenarios.

White's complaint is that Inception is all spectacle, no substance, that it plays with dreams and the subconscious while ignoring the real world--ultimately it is no more than a fancy card trick intended to cheat a mark out of his sawbuck (literally).

Armond White:

Reality is neither perceived nor penetrated in Inception. Cobb’s dream obsession suggests pop-culture addiction, mirroring how consumers habitually escape reality with video games and movies. But Nolan never critiques this as Neveldine/Taylor did in Gamer. Instead, gobbledy-gook like, “in dreams we create and perceive our world simultaneously,” or Matrix-isms like “the smallest idea is a resilient virus, it can grow to define or destroy you,” offer pseudo-distractions.

White's hecklers will of course draw irresistably to the comparison with Gamer, but I think what is off-base is White's expectation for moral exploration in a film that is mostly about the subconscious. White comes closer to the target when he points out that the movie does not really explore the addictiveness of the shared dream experience or its similarity to pop culture consumption and drug addiction (Inception references these ideas, so it's fair of White to ask).

The most likely explanation for this omission is that the movie simply doesn't have time to do justice to every idea it goes near, a failing I'm more than willing to accept given that most movies, let alone movies on this grand a scale, barely manage to find one idea. That said, Inception glides along without seeming compressed, giving full attention to its aim, and its 2 1/2 hour running time reaches the end right on satisfying schedule--an impressive feat especially for a movie which takes on dream logic.

What Inception has in common with Nolan's earlier Memento is the theme of mental damage leading to a crisis of identity and awareness. Here of course Nolan is exploring purely amoral aspects of the mind, impulses that the conscious mind is mainly a servant to--complications of our animal evolution and highly developed cerebrum. Nolan's fascination with the mind's workings leads him away from the conscious rationalizations of the moralizer and toward the interrogative analysis of the psychologist.

I believe the main complaint with Nolan is that he does not yet fit a recognizable category of filmmaker. By this I mean that Nolan has not yet created the signature work that could serve as a guide to a fully developed artistic outlook--his movies have a quality that one thinks of as "the early work" of a great director, or "the initial promise" of a disappointing one. He is somewhat like a pre-50s Hitchcock, whose films up to that point did not reveal the breadth of vision the director was about to unleash.

I mention Hitchcock because he, not Kubrick, seems the closest match. Hitchcock also shared an (albeit naive) interest in psychology and incorporated ideas relating to the human mind into many of his films. Like Nolan, Hitchcock's interest was not purely clinical; he respected the other sides of filmmaking, the technical accomplishment as well as the entertainment of an audience with a spectacular story. Hitchcock lacked the artistic temperament of auteurs like Godard and Resnais, or their ponderously arty modern equivalents (as experienced in such films as Synecdoche, New York and The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou). But while Nolan shows little inclination to become "highbrow" in that sense, he has stayed above the Cameron-Spielberg brand of indulgent self-entertainment.

It's a possibility of course that Nolan will stall at this level. His extant filmography does not give a strong indication. But even so White's comparison with The Matrix is unfair. Nolan is miles beyond the Wachowskis in maturity and basic sanity--Inception is not plumbed from the bad pop culture heap of comic books and kung fu movies.

The ideas in Inception are intelligent ideas, ultimately having to do with the twisted kind of fantasy or wish fulfillment that emerges from grief and guilt. The main character, Cobb, makes a shadowy living as an extractor of secrets from the minds of his targets, mostly (it appears) corporate executives, as these would be the people most likely to pay for and have secrets worth stealing. The "not strictly legal" nature of his work is part of Cobb's on-the-run lifestyle; he is unable to return to America to see his children, though we are not told precisely why at first. But, as the familiar saying goes, if he can pull off this one last job...

The job, though, is something thought to be next to impossible: not the theft of an idea, but the implantation of one--an idea that, when fully realized, will result in the dissolution of a business empire. It is by this point in the movie that one is carried giddily along as obstacles mount on top of obstacles, and one is immersed in the world of the dream. To conceal the implantation of the idea from the target, Cobb and his associates must travel down several levels of dreams, each occurring in more compressed periods of real world time. A second becomes a minute becomes an hour...

As with Memento, there is a fascination with the way each idea fits together; one admires the way the story is kept moving while leaving nothing confused or unclear, which must explain the long gestation this project had (Nolan states he started working on it ten years ago). The pacing issues in particular must have been daunting, but Nolan manages them with an exhilarating confidence.

Inception is Nolan in top form--the movie is the most original and entertaining thing in years--and he just may be about to reach for the next level as a filmmaker.

[PLEASUREMAN]

I agree with Stiva about Joseph Gordon-Levitt; the whole cast is well chosen, and I also liked Tom Hardy alot. "You mustn't be afraid to dream a little bigger, darling," was definitely a trailer-worthy line reading.

[cleon]

Everyone on my facebook feed says its sick.

That said I dunno about the shutter island reference. The twist in that movie was pretty obvious 10 minutes into the movie.

Also: Go see splice at your local negro infested dollar movie theater. Best movie experience ever. I swear, every dvd should have a negro audience track instead of the gay ass commentary. Mystery Ghetto Theater.



OOOOOOOOOOH U NASSSSSAY fellow white person IT WEN SKKKKEET SKEEET

[PLEASUREMAN]

cleon, 18 July 2010 - 02:04 AM:

Everyone on my facebook feed says its sick.

That said I dunno about the shutter island reference. The twist in that movie was pretty obvious 10 minutes into the movie.

Also: Go see splice at your local negro infested dollar movie theater. Best movie experience ever. I swear, every dvd should have a negro audience track instead of the gay ass commentary. Mystery Ghetto Theater.



OOOOOOOOOOH U NASSSSSAY fellow white person IT WEN SKKKKEET SKEEET

that would really own for horror movies...too bad it's "racist" to record black people

[Legs McDuck]

PLEASUREMAN, 18 July 2010 - 03:26 AM:

cleon, 18 July 2010 - 02:04 AM:

Everyone on my facebook feed says its sick.

That said I dunno about the shutter island reference. The twist in that movie was pretty obvious 10 minutes into the movie.

Also: Go see splice at your local negro infested dollar movie theater. Best movie experience ever. I swear, every dvd should have a negro audience track instead of the gay ass commentary. Mystery Ghetto Theater.



OOOOOOOOOOH U NASSSSSAY fellow white person IT WEN SKKKKEET SKEEET

that would really own for horror movies...too bad it's "racist" to record black people

That would. But then for every dozen unique voices there would be 80 IP lawsuits demanding a cut. Would the release forms get signed? Would that have a chilling effect on the quality of the commentary?

[PLEASUREMAN]

I DINT SINE DAT I KNOW WUT I SINE
GIMME SUMA DAT MUNY

[PLEASUREMAN]

For those interested, here are two links to some of the viral marketing done for Inception:

http://www.wired.com...re-manual/all/1

http://www.pasivdevice.org/

[A. No. 2]

Inception is an incredible movie and needed in these times of shit-films

[PLEASUREMAN]

Inception bowed to $62.8 million, at the high end of what was anticipated for an original, non-franchise sci fi movie. Word of mouth seems very positive, and the pic should get healthy repeat business due to a dense, intriguing story. Going to see it in IMAX later this week.

[darkestofniggers]

"I got bored halfway through and wandered off. It's incredibly cliche." -

[Probably Not]

A sign that Inception is actually good: several movie critics try to bash it in various ways to earn some cred. Ultimately harmless stuff like Toy Story 3 isn't worth taking a shot at (unless you're Armond White and actually take your job seriously), but making a run at a genuinely good movie is a way the would-be cognitive elites like to chase status.

Case in point:

Faggot Salon reviewer:

Speaking of pretentious: Ariadne? Really?

The fact that Nolan named his most prominent female character for the Greek woman who guided Theseus out of the Cretan labyrinth is a good sign Nolan was not concerned overmuch with subtlety. Put this way: Mal (pronounced as a homonym for "moll") is French for "bad." That thump you feel is a hammer coming down on your skull.

This poor reviewer. You see, he really has to tell us that he went to college and therefore knows who "Ariadne" is and understands French to boot. Unfortunately, his postmodern liberal arts education only allows him to make clumsy one-dimensional connections ("durr, 'Mal' is bad, she is bad, how obvious!"). Worse, he assumes that his own limitations are everyone's: because this is as far as his imagination could go that must be the limit to Nolan's story. Not so.

See, if "Mal" is pronounced like "moll" that's what the audience is going to think. Particularly since we don't see her name printed until the end credits. And because of that likeness - as well as the way her costume and makeup are done, which hearken back to 20s and 30s gangster pics - the audience is more likely to think of "moll" as in the female companion of a villain. From the name we sense that something isn't entirely right about Cobb (this feeling is reinforced by a number of other elements). We sense it without having to be told. That's good artistry.

Same thing with "Ariadne". This reviewer just leaves it at noticing the name and then sticking in his explanation, which might as well be cut-and-paste from Wikipedia. But the name has some further cleverness to it: if we know that Page is Ariadne, and we remember something of the myth, we know that Leo is Theseus. Meaning he needs her, but he will also ultimately abandon her. Which, um, he does. We might even realize that Nolan has been kind of clever, because in the myth Ariadne just knows a trick to get Theseus out of the labyrinth. But in the film, she knows this trick because she's playing double-duty as Daedalus (in the myth, he's the one who designed the maze). She's not just a tragic Ariadne who will be left behind, she's also a talented craftsman. By the way, this is a nice modern take on the Ariadne figure which subtly allows the character to be a more modern woman without turning her into a cunt or a dude with tits. So, Nolan uses a classical allusion which adds to the richness of the story the more familiar one is with the underlying mythology. Again, good artistry.

If the author really wanted to point to something "obvious" and somewhat inartistic I can think of an excellent example from the last third of the film. There's a point where Cobb is shooting guards at the ice fortress and Ariadne stops to ask if doing this is crippling the dreamer. Cobb explains that they're just projections. Now, THIS is the sort of thing that a producer or a script supervisor at some point asked for, almost certainly. It doesn't feel quite right in the script - and, in fact, it isn't necessary because the point has been made several times that these figures are "projections". Some sandy vagina at some point got worried that audiences might start to wonder if all this mayhem might not be damaging poor Cillian Murphy, and probably told Nolan to stick something in which answered any and all questions. Which he did, about as smoothly as he could. But it's not needed. I wouldn't call it bad, but it's not a high point of the film and a legitimate criticism could be made about it. There are a few other points like this, too - my guess is Nolan conceded these points in order to make an overall smart movie.

If you want to look at the rest of the review and the "Q&A" after, here's the link. Beware, though, it's Salon (ie, really gay).
http://www.salon.com...iner/index.html

[PLEASUREMAN]

darkestofniggers, 20 July 2010 - 11:56 AM:

"I got bored halfway through and wandered off. It's incredibly cliche." -

when you have a 188 IQ, it's hard for something to keep your interest...that's how you end up working a shitty account manager job and having no friends and believing crazy shit I guess...don't you wish you could have that lifestyle

like if only there were a drug that could make you obsess about crazy shit, hate your dad, and watch TV shows about gay teens all day while pretending to be an Orthodox Christian...sign me the fuck up

[PLEASUREMAN]

An important thing to remember about critics is that they have a weak track record when it comes to picking which movies will endure--or even which movies they will recall liking years hence. Kubrick's The Shining, to name one example, got very mixed reviews--many critics slammed it, even though today it is accepted as one of the director's best films and possibly the best horror film of all time. But at the time, Nicholson's performance was considered over-the-top, and the film was considered inferior to King's sloppy novel (read Variety's review for an example).

Name almost any enduring film, and critical reaction was likely very mixed. Meanwhile it is easy to reel off a long list of movies that critics adored but which left no impact, even with these same critics years later.

The problem is that criticism draws the wrong type of person--the pretentious libarts grad who thinks that having an opinion about art means he understands it, who consciously forms opinions to signal status, and who thinks that critiquing art makes him the artist's supervisor (mediocrities are irresistably drawn to positions where they can give managerial evaluations of something). Real criticism examines art as art, something these false critics almost never do.

Typically they bring no insights--and routinely get offended when movies do not pander to their personal obsessions.

[cleon]

i think its sort of the same thing when non musicians critique music or even more annoying; people that dont train blabbing off their opinions of what some fighter should be doing/have done.

[THAT RED GUY]

Probably Not, 20 July 2010 - 01:48 PM:

Beware, though, it's Salon (ie, really gay).

Quote

Fri Apr 02, 2010 12:33 am Billy Jack: I swear, we have some of the smartest and wittiest people.
Fri Apr 02, 2010 12:33 am Billy Jack: If they would just put their posts in article format we could be motherfucking Salon.

[Jeff Fries]

Why isn't anyone asking the important questions

Jordan Hoffman, UGO fellow:

There are two concepts that truly don't make sense. One is a niggling point about the perception of time and how it relates to hearing synchronized music (there's no way I could explain this to someone who has not seen the film) and the other, if I may be blunt, is this: no boobs? We're inside six guys's subconscious [sic] for a long period of time and no one, ever, gets naked?

[The Jewish Conspiracy]

Jeff Fries, 27 July 2010 - 01:19 AM:

Why isn't anyone asking the important questions

Jordan Hoffman, UGO fellow:

There are two concepts that truly don't make sense. One is a niggling point about the perception of time and how it relates to hearing synchronized music (there's no way I could explain this to someone who has not seen the film) and the other, if I may be blunt, is this: no boobs? We're inside six guys's subconscious [sic] for a long period of time and no one, ever, gets naked?

Considering the entire cast is homosexual it shouldn't come as a surprise.
Also Rex Reed? How is he not dead of AIDS yet? Motherfucker is a poz party queen...wonders never cease.

[PLEASUREMAN]

Rex Reed is like the Thomas Friedman of film reviewers

[darkestofniggers]

it was pretty sick. good special effects, cool premise. definitely have to watch a second time to catch it all, but it was still accessible on the first viewing. i would have liked to see more crazy dream effects, like the escher stuff and outside senses being filtered thru the dream, though i don't think the movie suffered without them.



sometimes when i watch sci fi movies, i think about the negative effects they will have on crazy schizophrenic people, like how avatar made people get depression, or how various alien movies color UFO reports, and so on. when watching this movie i wondered how many people will kill themselves thinking its all a dream. it seems like if you read the really deep end conspiracy websites, their ideas are a lot of times rehashes of movie plots. more responsible than black helicopter illuminati thrillers, i guess.