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Inception - July 16th
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On top of that, Leo's character is supposed to be the "master" of this dream stuff, but he seems to constantly have other people around him who know considerably less about it, coming up with solutions to problems that he apparently can't think his way out of.
And yes, I agree with point 4. However, the film takes it's dream concept from Descartes, and one of the things he said about what he called "the dream doubt" was that dreams as based in reality, and you are unable to imagine things you haven't seen in real life. So I guess that's probably where Nolan took the idea from.
And that whole maze stuff that the Ellen Paige's character could do was hugely underused and could have made for some really interesting and cool scenes.
Aside from these flaws though, I still think it was a good film, if over-rated. The heist was shockingly simple too.
Inception is not a complicated film. If you thought it was complicated, then you probably didn't understand it, and if you are disappointed that it wasn't complicated, then you were missold it by someone.
It's incredibly simple, in concept, but very well executed.
It's incredibly simple, in concept, but very well executed.
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Uh oh.
That's the point. The film could have been an hour shorter. It's a simple idea, (a heist film with a gimmick) made pointlessly complex and presented badly (bad pacing, music over nearly every scene, excessive dialogue)....strip away the "complexity" and it's just a generic action film, with crappy action and a lot of talking. What's so special about that?
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The film is not complicated at all, infact I would say it's by design that things are kept as simple as possible in direct service of the ambiguity. I wouldn't say it's wrong for someone to criticise the lack of character development, but I do think it's worth noting that it's absolutely intentional. The more back story/motivation you add to the other characters, the more the ending would start to lean to a particular side.
Another example would be the device they use to enter dreams. It is essentially a briefcase with a wire coming out of it, no other explanation is given. But again, for this particular film, no explanation is exactly the right amount of explanation. On one side you could class it as using movie logic, instead of coming up with some dumb explanation, we're just given 'here's the device, it works'. In a way that's easier to buy than being fed some explanation that you know to be bs. Alternatively, it makes just as much sense to say in a dream, it would simply work. Just another area of the film where no side of the argument makes considerably more sense than the other.
I really can't think of an area where the film felt overly complicated. Might be possible to see the number of dream layers used as excessive, but then without the concept being made very clear within the film, how could the ending be seen as anything other than reality?
Overall, I don't think I was quite as taken with the film as some people, definately worth a watch though.
Another example would be the device they use to enter dreams. It is essentially a briefcase with a wire coming out of it, no other explanation is given. But again, for this particular film, no explanation is exactly the right amount of explanation. On one side you could class it as using movie logic, instead of coming up with some dumb explanation, we're just given 'here's the device, it works'. In a way that's easier to buy than being fed some explanation that you know to be bs. Alternatively, it makes just as much sense to say in a dream, it would simply work. Just another area of the film where no side of the argument makes considerably more sense than the other.
I really can't think of an area where the film felt overly complicated. Might be possible to see the number of dream layers used as excessive, but then without the concept being made very clear within the film, how could the ending be seen as anything other than reality?
Overall, I don't think I was quite as taken with the film as some people, definately worth a watch though.
Actually just to address this specific point, the entire purpose of the dream is to recreate reality with the goal of ensuring that the subject does not know it is a dream, and so allowing extraction/inception. It's the basis of the movie itself and it's made quite clear that even slight deviations from 'reality' and the subject can become aware.
sorry but this is proven a while ago that i think the director or writer of the story even said it and its a common mistake what people think
In the end Verhoeven states quite clearly in the special edition DVD commentary that Quaid is indeed on the table at Rekall living out a fantasy. He points out that the imagery on the screen at Rekall show the alien machine, the girl of his dreams that he asked for and a blue sky over Mars. Verhoven points this out as Quaid is going to sleep. When Quaid\Hauser is confronted by his wife & the Rekall spokesman, Verhoven is quick to point out that the spokesman goes on to detail the entire second half of the movie. Verhoven also says that the movie fades to white instead of the normal fade-to-black due to the fact that Quaid is lobotomized by the Rekall doctors at that point. One can theorize that Verhovens insistence that Quaid was living a fantasy the whole time on the DVD commentary is due to the fact that the sequel that was supposed to star Schwarzenegger as Quaid was scrapped. Therefore there was no need to have the Total Recall story be anything more than the implant gone awry.
?????
Too many plot holes if you believe that, even the original story is based on the fact that Quiad HAD been to Mars.
Verhoven belives Robocop is a modern day retelling of the birth of christ as well.
Its nothing but misdirection.
Thats called a McGuffin, it is an object that just "is", it requires no explanation of to how it works, but it is either the motive force for the movie or a major plot device.
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Yes, but that's just something that was written in the script. It's not like they couldn't change that at will.
You can train yourself to easily spot trademarks of your own dreams to start lucid dreaming, but what if the dream is being imposed/designed by someone else? Your brain/body will also take care of convincing you that what you see in a dream is real. It's not really something that is set in stone and a fairly rubbish reason for making the dream world in the film so dull.
As in the briefcase in Pulp Fiction init blud.
You don't need to know what was in it, just that it was valuable or desireable enough for everyone to want it.
If you read on the net about it people have come up with Marcellus Wallace's soul, Cocaine, cash and even his dirty laundry.
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I fail to see how the film would have been better if you arbitrarily cut a whole hour from it.
And no, it was not "generic" and the action was not "crappy". Very few films have done anything like what Inception did.
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i disagree with those saying its not complicated.yep its not going to blow your mind but it has a lot of subtle references to a lot of events in the film as nolan stated in an interview.
2 example of this:
Cobb and his wedding band, signifying dream/non dream
and
the 2 kids and their trainers.
both are easy ways of clarifying the ending and what it means. as i said at the start its not massively mind blowing but it does have a lot of subtle ideas in their that your average joe bloggs wouldnt pick up.
to claim the action as generic though? really?? the corridor scene alone is some of the best piece of filming i have ever seen and still made me go wow on the second viewing....its stunning.
and nolan should really be given credit for using old school film techniques and REAL action as apposed to the same old cgi bs.
2 example of this:
Cobb and his wedding band, signifying dream/non dream
and
the 2 kids and their trainers.
both are easy ways of clarifying the ending and what it means. as i said at the start its not massively mind blowing but it does have a lot of subtle ideas in their that your average joe bloggs wouldnt pick up.
to claim the action as generic though? really?? the corridor scene alone is some of the best piece of filming i have ever seen and still made me go wow on the second viewing....its stunning.
and nolan should really be given credit for using old school film techniques and REAL action as apposed to the same old cgi bs.
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It would have saved me an hour of energy-sapping dialogue listenage. The dialogue and the constant explanation of everything that is happening or is going to happen was just unnecessary. It was the same in the Dark Knight.
[dramatic music]
We have to do this, then we can do this, but we can't just now because of this. Then we'll do this, that, bla bla bla bla.
[/dramatic music]
Then a fairly lacklustre action scene. Then some admittedly reasonable CGI/effects. Then back to another eternity of explanatory dialogue.
Well, that's really a matter of opinion.
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I did consider it that the lack of character development could have been intentional, but then we start walking the "auteur" line.
The lack of character development, use of video game logic and the lack of exposition are fine if you're creating an "art film" (like Memento) but when you do it in a Hollywood blockbuster we shouldn't have to explain away shortcomings in the script and story by using the "it was intentional" explanation. For example, this film doesn't have any of the other hallmarks that one could perhaps use to place it in the "art cinema" category.
That particular argument, inevitably, comes back to auteur theory and asking whether we should consider the lack of explanation intentional on the basis of it being one of the directors "signature moves" if you like. Certain things will go unexplained if they serve as a plot device, but I completely disagree with writing off the shortcomings with the script as "intentional" on the basis of character development. Sorry, but I just can't buy that.
While I don't disagree with the "auteur theory" as such, and I do feel Nolan can comfortably fall into this category given the commonalities between his films, I can't apply that thinking to the lack of character development.
We accept something's as given for pure entertainments sake; the use of the briefcase; the creation of certain sedatives to induce certain kinds of sleep; the dream within a dream concept and so forth, but lack of character development shouldn't be explained away as intentional - it's clearly not. Cobb is the only one with even a hint of it, and even at that it's stretched pretty thin in order to use it as a narrative device.
Also, until about half way through the film I was thinking "this is Nolan's best" until he wheeled out the video game logic. It's not a problem in some of his other films (best example is the withholding of information in The Prestige until the end for a great pay off) and the only thing that differentiates this from his others is that he wrote the script on his own.
And its use goes against the idea that Inception is a complicated film, it's the same with Saito and his ability to get some very serious charges dropped. Both concepts are as simple as they can possibly be, we are given no more than neccessary because in the end it doesn't actually matter either way.
I don't see it as making excuses tbh, to me it's more about what he wanted to achieve with the film. Two more or less equally viable conclusions at opposite ends of the scale, there's just no way I could see that being an accident. Seems very clear he wanted to leave people thinking wtf at the end of the film, and while we can question as much as we want, no side will ever truly be able to convince the other. Any extra character development would only add weight to one side of the argument.
Same applies to the above, if every layer but the final scene was completely crazy, how could the film ever retain the ambiguity?
Maybe the lack of character development was one of the reasons why I didn't enjoy the film as much as I thought I would, I'm not sure really. But I've never thought of the omissions as anything other than a means for Nolan to achieve the audienece reaction that the film ultimately received.
I disagree. There was attempts to flesh out other characters in the film but they just petered out into nothing. We got little bits of what most of the characters were like, and failing to develop them pretty much leaves them as one dimensional people who don't have any real say in the plot of the film. Which is clearly wrong, because at some stage most of the main characters, at some point, suddenly had some important vital idea to contribute in a situations of great need.
He could still have had extra character development in the last hour of the film and left the conclusion open ended. It was done in The Prestige, Insomnia and in Memento. The latter of which still retained a great deal of ambiguity at the end/start/whatever of the film.
To me, it is clear that the lack of character development is lack of writing skill, more than anything else.
Or you could also say failing to expand the characters leaves them much closer to the way a person might be presented in a dream? I've never dreamt about someones backstory or even their motivation, they just are.
I agree the discussion would still be happening even if there was character development beyond Cobb, although at that point we might be much closer to an accepted answer vs a crackpot theory.
I agree the discussion would still be happening even if there was character development beyond Cobb, although at that point we might be much closer to an accepted answer vs a crackpot theory.