Since everyone’s talking about it and 8th St always has its hand on the cultural pulse, it was pretty inevitable something about Inception was going to pop up sooner or later. And we can all breathe a sigh of relief after being subject to the mindless Hollywood crapola (Knight and Day anyone?) or the endless sequels/remakes (Karate Kid, Marmaduke – UGH, and dare I mention SATC 2?!) we’ve been seeing in the cinema of late.
You’ve probably heard the rough storyline of Inception. Leo (just a wrinklier, manlier, more rugged version of the baby-faced Jack from Titanic), or should I say Dom Cobb, manipulates dreams along with his team comprising of Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page and others. A (I’m assuming) mega-rich Asian corporate big-wig enlists this team to carry out the very tricky task of ‘inception’ – planting an idea into someone’s head - to carry out his own evil, devious and immoral/unethical business strategies.
If that’s not complicated enough, add the slight distraction of Mal (Marion Cotillard, such a French hottie), Cobb’s deceased wife, who keeps popping up in his dreams and killing other people (in the dream, that is). Clearly he has a bit of a guilty conscience.
The first half of the film revolves around Cobb teaching Ariadne (Ellen Page) about the ins and outs of delving into someone's dream. The second half is where the actual inception takes place. It’s completely messed up, but in a good Christopher Nolan-esque way. Think all the drama of The Dark Knight but a bit more intellectual.
Jo-Go. Best dream, hands down.
What the film does so well is to juggle a conceptually tricky idea yet still manage to keep the film approachable enough so that the general mouth-breathing public is able to keep up (or am I being too cynical about the intelligence levels of the wider community?). In saying that, however, it does take some degree of effort to understand exactly what is happening as the film goes in and out of four different ‘levels’ of dreams. Each level is visually spectacular and apparently each had its own colour palette to make it easier for the audience to subconsciously distinguish between them.
Trippy, eh?
The CGI effects are quite brilliant and mind-boggling, and the eye candy (I’m talking about Jo-Go, not Leo) is not too bad either. Marion Cotillard is FREAKY! But in a good way. I think she’s really stunning, though I’ve talked to some people who have thought otherwise.
To be honest, I thought Ariadne was completely redundant as a character even if I did love Juno. My other qualm was the music. Ok, it was effectively dramatic at times, but it was overkill in certain circumstances. Oh, and the much-debated ending. But I won’t spoil that for those who haven’t had the opportunity to watch this film. Besides those things, the movie was damn good. An intellectual and visual treat!
This movie gets 9/10. For realz.
~ Hurley Who?
PS. Hope I didn’t spark a ‘IS JO-GO HOT OR NOT’ debate with my above comment/s.
