Inception
Disc: Blu-ray
Number of discs: 2 Disc Edition
Genre: Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
Director: Christopher Nolan
Cast: Leonardo DiCaprio, Ken Watanabe, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Marion Cotillard, Ellen Page
Language: English (DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1), French (Dolby Digital 5.1), Spanish (Dolby Digital 5.1)
Subtitle: English, French, Spanish
Rating: 4 / 5
Run Time: 148 minutes
Studio: Warner Home Video
Format: AC-3, Color, Dolby, Widescreen, Subtitled, DTS Surround Sound
Year: 2010
I still remember watching Leonardo DiCaprio on the sitcom Growing Pains. How cute he was..
Brief Synopsis: In a world where technology exists to enter the human mind through dream invasion, a highly skilled thief is given a final chance at redemption which involves executing his toughest job to date: Inception.
Acclaimed filmmaker Christopher Nolan directs an international cast in this sci-fi actioner that travels around the globe and into the world of dreams. Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) is the best there is at extraction: stealing valuable secrets inside the subconscious during the mind’s vulnerable dream state. His skill has made him a coveted player in industrial espionage but also has made him a fugitive and cost him dearly. Now he may get a second chance if he can do the impossible: inception, planting an idea rather than stealing one. If they succeed, Cobb and his team could pull off the perfect crime. But no planning or expertise can prepare them for a dangerous enemy that seems to predict their every move. An enemy only Cobb could have seen coming.
Science-fiction features often involve time travel or strange worlds. In Christopher Nolan’s heist thriller Inception, the concepts converge through the realm of dreams. With his trusty associate, Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt, a fine foil), Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio, in a role that recalls Shutter Island) steals ideas for clients from the minds of competitors. Fallen on hard times, he’s become estranged from his family and hopes one last extraction will set things right. Along comes Saito (Ken Watanabe, Batman Begins), who hires Cobb to plant an idea in the mind of energy magnate Fischer (Cillian Murphy, another Batman vet).
Less experienced with the art of inception, Cobb ropes in an architecture student (Ellen Page), a chemist (Dileep Rao), and a forger (Tom Hardy) for assistance. During their preparations, Page’s Ariadne stumbles upon a secret that may jeopardize the entire operation: Cobb is losing the ability to control his subconscious (Marion Cotillard plays a figure from his past). Until this point, the scenario can be confusing, since the action begins inside a dream before returning to reality. Then, after the team gets to Fischer, three dream states play out at once, resulting in four narratives, including events in the real world. It all makes sense within the rules Nolan establishes, but the impatient may find themselves much like Guy Pearce in Memento: completely confused. If Inception doesn’t hit the same heights as The Dark Knight, Nolan’s finest film to date, it’s a gravity-defying spectacular to rival Dark City and The Matrix.
Disc Content:
Disc 1
- The movie.
- Extraction Mode: Infiltrate the movie’s imaginative landscape to learn how Christopher Nolan, Leonardo DiCaprio, and the cast and crew designed and achieved the film’s signature moments.
Disc 2
- Dreams: Cinema of the Subconscious: Can the dream world be a fully functional parallel reality? Joseph Gordon-Levitt and leading scientists take you to the cutting edge of dream research.
- Inception: The Cobol Job: Comic prologue in full animation and motion: see the events that led to the beginning of the movie.
- 5.1 soundtrack selections from Hans Zimmer’s versatile score.
- Conceptual art, promotional art, and trailer/TV spot galleries.
- Via BD-Live: Project Somnacin–Confidential Files: Access highly secure files that reveal the inception of the dream-share technology.
Here’s a review by Michael J. Tresca:
On the surface Inception seems to be a crime caper, complete with master of disguise Eames (Tom Hardy), planner Aridane (Ellen Page), point man Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), and master thief Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio). But it’s so much more than that, taking place in dreams within dreams within dreams.
Inception, like Total Recall and The Matrix, is about perception. The audience is never sure what reality is because the protagonist isn’t sure what’s real. There are clues providing evidence for the real/not real theories, but the best movies of this type don’t come down on one side or another. Total Recall ultimately had enough clues indicating the “right” way. The Matrix stumbled after it made it clear that reality was fiction, thereby losing an audience who enjoyed the tantalizing mystery. Like so many mysteries, once the truth was revealed it wasn’t quite as exciting as we all hoped. Inception wisely avoids providing answers.
Inception is also a thought experiment. The central conceit of Inception is that once you put a thought in someone’s head it’s like a virus, incapable of being removed. In fact, attempting to not think about the idea causes the mind to just focus on it more. This concept, a key tenet of neuro-linguistic programming (NLP), is part of how our brains are wired. Director Chris Nolan knows exactly what he’s doing when the characters explain the premise. It is the key argument between Cobb and his wife Mal (Marion Cotillard): is this life just a dream?
Once you get it into your head as to which of them is right, Inception burrows into your psyche and you see all the evidence you need to reinforce the idea. There are enough discrepancies to suspect that Cobb’s stuck in a dream, but there are enough rules defining reality that indicate otherwise. Unless, of course, you believe that Cobb is fooling himself by making up said rules to convince himself he’s not in a dream when he actually is. If that sounds confusing, Inception’s done its job.
Inception is a little too long in places, testing the viewer’s patience as it delves four levels deep into the subconscious, each with different timeframes, settings, and plots. Part of the fun is watching the movie again to look for clues that reinforce what we secretly thought we knew all along.
Me? I’m convinced I know the truth. But then maybe Inception put that idea in my head.
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