It’s the summer of Nolan. Inception rules the box office. It’s a blockbuster, for sure. But it’s nothing like what we have come to expect from traditional Hollywood summer fare.
I admit that I was overwhelmed, and my review is here.
Having thought about the film some more, I want to suggest that it’s got three traits that are worth pondering, and that illuminate problematic areas in much blockbuster screenwriting:
1 – Concept and consequence.
The world that Nolan creates in the film… The basic premise of the plot within this world, or rather worlds… There is so much setting up, and there is a seemingly endless potential for expansion. Indeed, the first hour of the film is dense with dialogue and set-ups, which need to be satisfactorily payed off in the second half of the film. Nolan elegantly by-passes stereotypical Hollywood storytelling in this area.
I’ve seen some comments here and there by people who were underwhelmed by the action sequences. But for me, the ultimate trick of the film is the expanding time frames in consecutive dream-worlds, and the way Nolan masterfully ties this concept to the very-slowly-falling van that drives off the bridge. The way time almost grinds to a halt here, at least in one layer of the story, and then the shock as the characters are plunged back into reality… I gasped more than once.
2 – Leaving the device alone.
The technology that enables the characters to travel between worlds is never properly explained. Thank God! It’s a given in the film’s story universe that all the characters are already familiar with it. Some will say this is chickening out from explaining the impossible. I would say that’s exactly the point, and Nolan is smart enough to understand that his audience would not accept any attempt at explanation, and trusts us enough to leave it alone and get on with the story.
3 – Character ambiguity.
A key point in the film. There is no real hero in Inception. DiCaprio’s character is a deeply flawed and often unsympathetic man. Nolan makes the best use of DiCaprio that I’ve seen in a long time. But added to this, Inception also lacks a villain. Ken Watanabe could be seen as the antagonist of the piece, but this assumption quickly falls apart. Thus, the film becomes something much more interesting than your common blockbuster, and provides a roller-coaster ride that is also deeply intelligent and emotionally complex.
The counter-point exists with Marion Cottilard’s very one-dimensional character. Which ties in perfectly with the intellectual concept of memories and dreams as the film unfolds.
I still think that Christopher Nolan is one of the three or four most interesting American filmmakers working today. David Fincher and Darren Aronofsky are others. And I still root for M. Night Shyamalan, although I have yet to see The Last Airbender…
Christer
Here’s an interesting article about the film:
http://www.davidbordwell.net/blog/?p=9692
Pål
With Inception being released in time for the holidays, I sat down for a second viewing tonight. Box office and critical acclaim clearly shows that Nolan has succeeded in making a movie that audiences love to puzzle over. But for film scholars like Christer, Inception is a regular treasure trove!
I’ll just jump in and mention that I think the movie has a clear and defined antagonist. Mal. Both in the flashbacks to when she was alive, and when she is a projection of Dom’s subconscious later on, she incessantly wreaks havoc. She even talks and acts like a classic action movie villain, with the same wild mood swings that we’ve come to expect and love. For god’s sake, she even has a heavy continental accent! Hans Gruber i skirts!
Christer
Absolutely! And what a villain she is. The first time I saw the film, it took me a while to grasp the point of the character. She seemed annoyingly flat and much like a noir-parody. Then of course I realized her one-dimensionality is the entire point, in so many ways…
Another interesting thing about the movie is the design of the dream worlds. I have had discussions with viewers who object to how these worlds seem a little too normal, meaning that it’s not like anything can happen and anything is possible in these dreams. Well, I have to strongly insist that this is what makes them believable as dream worlds, at least for me. I can’t do anything I want to in my dreams. Everything is not possible. My dreams follow rules and logic very similar to the real world, with just that little weird twist here and there, like a staircase that never resolves its path. Its another sign of Nolan’s brilliance that his dream worlds are weird, but just barely different from reality.
If only all blockbuster summers had one of these…
Pål
Totally agree about the design of the dream worlds!
This is a heist movie, paying homage to, amongst others, James Bond films, and that’s what important here – not mimicking actual dreams. Nolan creates a universe here with its own rules. The central motifs are strictly adhered to. For example the point about all dreams have no real beginning, you’re just suddenly in the midst of it. Nolan excellently uses this in the first half of the film. None of the scenes are established in the usual sense, we just float from one scene into the next. The mazes are another great example. Even in Mombasa the scene follows the dream structure. Cobb flees from henchmen that behave like dream projections through the labyrinthine city streets. And I just love the impossibly narrow alleyway that Cobb has to squeeze through! That’s the stuff that dreams are made of!
Pål
And Mal, of course, means “bad” in French…