“You mustn’t be afraid to dream a little bigger, darling,” is the advice that one character gives another in Christopher Nolan’s Inception. With this film, the director of The Prestige and The Dark Knight proves once again that no other big-budget filmmaker has dreams quite as large as his.
Part existential spy film, part science-fiction epic and part heist movie, Inception is by far the boldest and best film in a disappointing Hollywood summer season. It’s that rare blockbuster that dares to use its special effects budget to create an experience that as thrilling for the cerebrum as it is for the viscera.
Inception assembles a cast that includes six Oscar nominees and two Oscar winners in an ensemble film that puts a science fiction spin on James Bond, Ocean’s 11 and Ronin.
A team of elite specialists must infiltrate a rather different enemy territory — the subconscious mind. They must do so to put something in a vault rather than to steal a valuable item.
Leonardo DiCaprio stars as a thief who uses technology to enter people’s dreams to steal ideas from their subconscious. He takes on a last, high-risk job from a businessman (played by Ken Watanabe): to invade the dreams of an heir to an energy empire (Cillian Murphy) and plant an idea in his head. That’s the Inception of the film’s title.
“What’s the most resilient parasite? An idea,” says DiCaprio as Dom Cobb. “A single idea from the human mind can build cities. An idea can transform the world and rewrite all the rules.”
As homages and references to Stanley Kubrick, Ridley Scott, Orson Welles and many others fly by, it’s clear where the parasites that have taken root in Nolan’s head came from. Inception will probably be the germ of inspiration for the generation of filmmakers that follow Nolan.
This, as much as any Coen Brothers or Quentin Tarantino film, is a movie about the power of cinema. As Joseph Campbell said, myths are collective dreams. It is in Hollywood where the myths of our age are forged.
Nolan weaves a dream world largely inspired by Michael Mann, the director who made the greatest heist film of the 1990s with the De Niro and Pacino vehicle, Heat. Rather than flooding his dreams with florid imagery and psychedelic colours, he builds them from gunsteel greys, metallic blues and icy whites.
The impeccable cinematography offers a grand sense of scale as cityscapes collapse and fold in on themselves. The effect is hyperreal rather than surreal.
DiCaprio, fresh from his impressive work in Martin Scorsese’s Shutter Island, is well cast as a steely, resourceful thief haunted by a tragic past. Some of the best work comes from members of the supporting cast, including Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Michael Caine and Tom Berenger. Tom Hardy steals a number of scenes as a wisecracking forger who gives the film its few moments of levity.
Marion Cotillard, who won an Oscar for her portrayal of Edith Piaf in La Vie en Rose, with her perfectly sculpted hair and slinky black dresses is a timeless femme fatale. It’s Ellen Page, however, who arguably has the most important role in the film apart from DiCaprio. As a rookie member of DiCaprio’s team, she is our guide to the labyrinth of Nolan’s dream world.
Through her eyes we learn about the rules of the dream world DiCaprio and his team work in and keep track of the complex machinations of the plot. Several plot threads unfold at once, but Nolan offers some subtle signposts that make it relatively easy to keep up.
Inception succeeds as much as a special effects-driven summer movie as it does on other levels. The action sequences — clearly inspired by James Bond films, Heat and The Matrix — are handsomely staged and uniformly thrilling. Nolan has said he would love to do a Bond movie. Someone in Hollywood needs to make that happen.
Inception isn’t perfect. The film’s relentless barrage of effects starts to become a little wearying by the time credits roll after 150 minutes.
Some critics have complained that it doesn’t have much of an emotional centre, that it’s all head and no heart. The criticism isn’t entirely fair. Despite its apparent chilliness, Inception makes some space for moments of tenderness between breathlessly spitting out ideas and assailing the senses with special effects.
Inception trailer (YouTube):
But there is a sense, occasionally, that you’re watching a master craftsman at work rather than a great artist. As with Shutter Island, it’s the elegance of the construct that takes your breath away. Inception is as intricate and as carefully put together as a handmade Swiss watch.
Unlike Swiss watches, you can take Inception apart and reassemble it in a number of ways, and it will still work. The great pleasure of this film is that it lays its ideas in your head and you can feel them hatching, wriggling, mutating, and gnawing in your brain for days afterwards. — Lance Harris, TechCentral
- Inception opens in SA on 30 July
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