INCEPTION Post Release

You and Beaks both compare it to Lawrence of Arabia and call it a Miracle.

I'm pumped.

I read the first few paragraphs but didn't want to get spoiled any further. I can't fucking wait, though. Those paragraphs were enough to send me beyond excited. It's going to be tough waiting the two weeks for this thing.

Wow. I'm really pumped for this.

So Nolan finally learned how to shoot a fight scene, that's great to know.

I had to read the review even though the whole time I was saying to myself "Why even do this to yourself? You'll learn it all soon enough." I kept reading, though. I'm so rabid for this movie.

I have doubts this is going to do well, financially, but that really has no impact on Nolan. He'll make WB another billion with The Dark Knight Returns to Strike Back.

Great review.

This summer blockbuster season needs a real kick in the ass.

I've got a huge boner right now. And it might just last for the next 11 days.

That was actually not bad spoiler-wise, Devin, and a great review, although I still think Nolan made a massive leap in action filming with TDK anyway. But hey, different strokes.

And thanks for making me want to see this even more than I did already. This and Scott Pilgrim (haven't seen TS3 yet) look like they're going to be the highlights of this dismal summer (though Iron Man 2 wasn't bad).

will buy Imax ticket ASAP, but good damn, I have not had this much bloody anticipation since the Incredibles.

Was thinking of going to the Cinerama for this, but looks like Studio City IMAX might be getting me at midnight. Can't wait.

I'm also happy to hear Nolan managed to shoot some good action. That was my big fear with this movie. I thought the action in the two Batman movies was pretty dreadful.

Read the first paragraph, quickly checked the 10/10 rating, and sprinted out of that review. . . It's going to be hard staying away from the details over the next week or so.

Bought my ticket at the Ziegfeld here in NYC. Greatest traditional movie-house in the city. Will check it out at the IMAX Lincoln Square (the only REAL Imax in town) well after release so I don't have to fight for that coveted back-row, center seat.

Salivating . . .

Yeah, after skimming this and Beaks' review, I'm checking out on anything relating to this until I see it. Don't want to a) have anything spoiled and b) get too hyped for it.

The review has me anticipating it more now. Especially now with an idea what it's exactly about.

Really looking forward to JGL's zero gravity fight.

I just read all of the snippets over at Slash Film. It seems like I'm going to have to actively suppress some of my excitement in order to maximize the impact of the film itself.

Official Tomatometer is up.

Those quotes...yowsers.

Great review Devin! I don't feel it spoils a thing. We all know this is about dream intrusion, it doesn't feel like there is a big surprise in the film to be spoiled about, so I recommend people reading the review.

I promised myself I would leave this film alone until release, but the best laid plans of mice and men and all that.

I hate to bring this up, but the fanboy retardation that will follow when the Armond White review hits will be mind-numbing on an apocalyptic scale. You know they won't be able to resist.

So is this Leo's Oscar?

I'm with Freeman. Leo just seems like he's deserved one for awhile, and a huge film like this might be the perfect time for it.

I would hazard a guess (which is somewhat dependent on B.O.) that this is Nolan's nomination, especially with the 10 slots.

Great review, Devin. Thanks for keeping it spoiler free.

Devin,

I am beyond excited to read your review of INCEPTION (I skimmed, need to avoid spoilers). I have only seen the first trailer, and I've avoided ALL other press on the film. It seems like that rare kind of movie that only comes along only once in a while, and I really want to go in as fresh as possible. Literally all I know at this point is the cast, the director and the subject (dreams). I'll be waiting for the DVD release but as someone who has been a fan of Nolan since MEMENTO, your review just kicked my internal hype levels into overdrive. The DVD street date can't come a moment too soon, as far as I'm concerned. Glad to hear that this is the film that may finally turn the doubters around on Nolan, and your comment that his entire career has been building to this perfectly sets the tone for my first viewing of INCEPTION. Thanks again!

Devin, your review just made me that much more excited about this. Cant wait to see it for myself.

Excellent, excellent review. Devin writes so eloquently about Inception, without giving away any major spoilers, and by the end of the final paragraph I was really getting pumped about this movie and now I can't wait to see it. Although I love Nolan's TDK, after further retrospection about it I don't really think it is as grand as some fanboys want you to believe, but it looks like Inception may become Nolan's masterpiece, after all.

Fantastic, best of the year so far for sure. Multi-layered, but I never found it confusing. Half of the crowd went "OOOOOHHH!" when the final shot cut to black.

A million thanks to CHUD for the passes! I'm eager to pay for the privilege of seeing it again.

It's incredible. So good it may ruin the rest of the year for you.

Absolutely wonderful.


LOL, exact same reaction at my screening. Nolan sure knows how to manipulate the audience. The final frame simply makes you think more about everything you just saw.

Again, thank you to CHUD for getting me in.

Literally have not been able to stop thinking about it since it ended last night. Loved it, but turning it over in my mind I keep running up against contradictions to the rules of the world. Need to see it again immediately -- I figure that most of it is explained but that I just didn't catch it.

So regarding the ending:

1) Is it meant to be ambiguous?

2) If it's ambiguous, then the question is "Did Cobb make it back to reality or did he leave himself in a dream?"

Assuming that the ending is meant to be ambiguous, I would like to believe that Cobb made it back to reality and got to be with his family. However, as I was walking out with a friend, he noted that Cobb's kids hadn't gotten any older, so Cobb is in a dream.

I think the ending is tremendous either way it goes, but I wanted to know what other folks concluded.

I thought it was definitely meant to be ambiguous, since we see the dreidel wobble slightly, but it never stops spinning. I hadn't considered the kids aging though.

There are enough ambiguous elements to allow for any interpretation of course (as there should be), but I believe the text is there, and the emotional through-line is there for it to be interpreted most strongly as reality.

The top starts to show signs of wobbling as it inevitably must, but Nolan made the right call on how to cut that shot (sound is well done too). As for the kids, you can see it as indication that he remains locked in a dream, or you can read it (as I do) as emotionally recalling that image and finally allowing it to play out for himself.

Is there any concrete indication of how long he's been on the run?

Not as I recall.

I leaned towards Cole being back in reality, but it's certainly open to interpretation. I thought the way Leo kept saying he had to get "home" was purposefully ambiguous as well, and that "home" could have been more about finding peace of mind and moving on without Mal. But if that's the case, why is he still clinging to the memory of his children?

I noticed in the credits that the kids were played by two different sets of actors, with the characters differentiated by age.

EDIT: From IMDB--

Claire Geare ...Phillipa (3 years)
Magnus Nolan ...James (20 months)
Taylor Geare ...Phillipa (5 years)
Johnathan Geare ...James (3 years)

I need another viewing to figure out whether it's supposed to be ambiguous, or whether there's a definite answer buried in the film, but as I mentioned in the pre-release thread, I was reminded of the ending of Oldboy--the best ambiguous ending in recent memory.

Cobb's dream, I presume? What kind of issues is Cobb projecting through the Mal story, in that case? Do you think she's actually dead, just not through the circumstances we see?

Christ...this movie was tremendous. I'm really bummed that it's going to be a week before I can revisit it.

So basically, everything that we saw was a projection from Cobb? Interesting.

The one part that confused me was the scene between Leo and the elderly Watanabe. My assumption was that DiCaprio went to Watanabe in limbo to remind Watanabe to kill himself so they could all wake up? I know they set that moment up, but my memory is a bit fuzzy.

and if Cobb had to convince Watanbe's character to kill himself, is he now in the same predicament as Mal?

Tremendous film. The initial dream-building scenes with Page and DiCaprio were fantastic and I'll be damned if the shattering mirror didn't make the entire audience jump. I can't remember the last time I saw so many people completely immeresed in a film.

I thought this, too. But the entire movie isn't from Leo's perspective. You're seeing all kinds of different people doing things that he wouldn't be aware of or see.

Did anyone else notice that the scene with Old Man Watanabe was different the second time?

I wondered about this as well. For example, the scene with Gordon-Levitt where he tells Page to kiss her, then says it was "worth a shot." (One of the most playful moments in Nolan's oeuvre, btw)

Loved Gordon-Levitt in this as well, by the way. It's good to see him in a prominent mainstream role.

Also good to see him in full-on badass mode.

For a half second I thought the fake non-Eames Tom Berenger -- this sounds so ridiculous when you type it -- was the one who showed up in their hotel room. That would have been a really complicated move.

Devin, can we assume you'll be laying out your thinking behind that reading in a post-release piece on the front page?

Going with this interpretation, one could read it as Watanabe's (perhaps even Old Watanabe's) dream, right? That would be my main issue with the idea that the entire movie was a dream...how do you determine who's dream it is?

eta: I do like the ambiguity of that idea

I figured it was all a dream too. The whole movie is Cobb trying to rework his memories. So he uses this heist story as a way of making it all work. The kids turning at the end at the same spots where he saw them last, can't just be coincidence... or could it?

I think what's really fascinating is that Nolan has used the world of the dream to explain movie action cliches. The typical villains who have no depth or lines, that just shoot at the characters. They have purpose because they're simply projections of the mind. I believe there's more to all of that, I can't think of it at the moment.