I don't really intend to enter into the bold and unforgiving world of "film reviews" anytime soon. Not because I don't think I'm qualified enough to write a review (although I'm certainly not) or that my opinion doesn't matter enough to warrant a review being written (it certainly isn't), or that there are better reviewers than me anyway (Goodness me there are). It simply isn't in the spirit of the blog; I don't want to write reviews, I want to write overly-analytical, bothersome explorations of films!
On top of this, Inception is terrifically difficult to talk about anyway, because the films plot details have been kept so wonderfully concealed so far that to talk about pretty much anything could diminish the effect of the film. Oh right, yeah, it's really, really good, too. Just needed to slip that in somewhere.
So, what I'm going to do is talk about a few ideas in the film without actually spoiling plot details as I know how difficult it is to simply "stop reading" something (but, I should add I would consider the ideas in a film to be some of the most important aspects). Ready? Okay. Inception is a film concerning Solipsism. It doesn't really start that way, but it moves there eventually. However, Inception is not like The Matrix; it does not tell us our lives are illusions. The films message seems to be the delicious one that solipsism on it's own is dangerous enough (and the idea certainly is a destructive one). "The idea" - "the cancer" referred to in the film is the fallibility of being awake. "They come here to wake up".
The movie asks the audience if we can distinguish between reality and dreams, then ingeniously makes its dream sequences as realistic as possible. Both in terms of believability, and the fact that on several ocassions we're unaware we're even in a dream at all, to really drive the theme home. Of course, the film falls back on the sci-fi setting, so the questions don't really apply to us, but they at the very least raise the interesting topic of debate (and again in a more interesting way of just telling us the world in the film is fictional). It's unclear what side the film takes on the solipsism debate though; on the one hand the movie would lack the "catharsis" Cobb says is required if the notion of solipsism wasn't conquered in some form; however, what's conquered may not be the idea of solipsism so much as it's negatives effects. I will be spoiling the final shot of the film now, and although I don't think it will really damage viewing of the film, it may be better to avoid reading my thoughts on it if you haven't seen it yet. The final shot shows Cobb reuinited with his children; he is happy, finally, after so much strife and so much torture from his own subconcious. We see the top is still spinning over their laughter, and while it does seem to slow down slightly, we don't see it fall. The top throughout the movie, the "totem" is something that keeps the characters certain of where they are; that they are the dreamer, or at least are viewing the world unaltered. The fact the top is left spinning at the end of the film seems to be suggesting the possibility that Cobb remains in a dream (though I doubt he actually is) - however, he is happy. Does it really matter if Cobb is dreaming? He's happy now, finally.
Truth may be beauty, but most models are miserable.
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