Review: Inception

OK,Wow.

I would compare the experience of watching Inception, to every Salman Rushdie book I’ve ever read. That is, it is fully engrossing and at any given moment, I find myself shocked, impressed, and bewildered at many things. That the book is written in such fluid, animated language and that I can follow every long, winding sentence to its end because it is written to a standard which very few other writers can manage. So at any given moment in this film, a specific cluster in time, I was completely absorbed but the film put together, is a poor mystery masked with the guise of an action-packed thriller. Was that too complex? You should probably skip the movie if so.

Christopher Nolan, who directed The Dark Knight, The Prestige and Memento, is not an impresario. Do not expect the gimmickry and foolishness of a typical Roland Emmerich or James Cameron movie, Inception is not without genuine intrigue, brought forth by a strong and exotic cast of gifted actors. Leo Caprio is sturdy and impenetrable as the heavily-repressed Cobb, whereas youngsters Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Juno’s Ellen Page carry an intensity that is unusual for someone their age. On the surface, each character seems to play a unique and specialized role in the process of dream-weaving, we’ve got an Architect, a Chemist and so on, whose titles are self-explanatory.

The thing I have a problem with, is how shallow everything is. For something so complicated and intelligent, this film is immediately undone by its loopholes, and unrestrained willingness to explain the most superfluous ideas with such retarded simplicity. There is literally a scene where they brainstorm with five words written on a small whiteboard, and the final scheme involves two men wearing ski masks. When they enter a person’s dream, it is guarded by a numberless amount of men deemed security, which turn out to be a bunch of faceless non-threats that are gunned down like one of those sloppy zombies in a video game who expire with a single shot to the head.

The characters in this film are constantly conversing, no one ever for one second just shuts up. This is because the script is always having to explain itself, along with the music, composed by Dark Knight’s Hans Zimmer, the accompanying score is deeply electronic, loud and invasive, and it is these two elements: the dialogue and the soundtrack, who are positioned to narrate each high and low, every Q&A. The story is prone to take shortcuts, because when it does pause from its incessant blabbing, there are scenes that go on to define the film: the zero-gravity fighting scene was perfectly choreographed, but again, unsatisfactorily explained. Why are these two floating in a fight? Because as the van falls towards the river in the first level, gravity in the second level is absent. Why does a train arbitrarily appear ripping through a mid-city street? Because Cobb’s mind is uncontrollable and parts of its subconscious are leaking out. They appear in a dream raining and say “The target will need a cab”, bang into one and hijack it, then conveniently find the target hailing for a cab two seconds later.

At the very heart of Inception, is the backstory of Cobb and his deceased wife, played by the gorgeous Marrion Cotillard and how the two found their lives fatally distorted by the practice of dream-weaving. Time and again Cobb is confronted by an image of his dead wife, who is about as layered and riveting as a damn hologram. Everytime the two appear, either via flashback or a projection in his subconscious (don’t ask), she is whiny and repetitive (“You said we would grow old together!” literally makes up 97% of her lines), and I understand that his memory of her is a static and unchangeable piece of pure guilt, but these scenes were so over-orchestrated and sappy that it appeared more like a serried commercial for some rich, depressed woman’s perfume.

Visually, this is probably the most stunning thing you’ll see all year, and judging from the reception so far, Inception will definitely continue to make millions more at the box office. I can enjoy a summertime blockbuster as much as anyone else, and could easily put aside all these questions I have about the movie, but as someone who has seen every episode of LOST (I know, how condescending) and as a truly unforgiving wannabe film critic, I felt that a lot of compromises were made, the story was not at all fully formed, and the third act of the film was purely lazy filmmaking. Everything fell into place far too conveniently, although the stakes kept going higher and higher (“We can go under one more layer!” is the film’s way to segue into more irrelevant drama), so much of the logic was castrated to the point where the film had become all about fiction and entertainment but still persisted on branding itself a character story.

If ever a board game were to be made from this movie, sample questions would be: How long does it take for a van filled with six adults to fall off a bridge and hit a river? And, How long does it take for a Japanese man to die? Answers to both are: forever, or, as long as you need for it to happen in order for the story to be written however you want it. Some of the major subplots were speedily tied up with a “Actually, this is what happened”, and each physical part-the dream layers, their landscapes, gun sizes-seemed to grow as the film progressed, as if to distract us from each hastily-answered query.

I know that my every complaint can be answered with something, or rather, fans and lovers of Inception would be willing to latch on to any of the film’s broad and incomplete explanations as a comeback. But, the thing I personally love about this movie is that it is something I want to write lengthily about (already proven), it is something that will be discussed and debated for a while at least, and it is not entirely dismissible as many of the overhyped blockbusters we’ve seen in the past years. Plus, it’s a good break from the endless barrage of unoriginal sequels or remakes that appear to be dominating theatres this year.

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