”Inception’ is not a film without flaws. It is a spiritual successor to ‘The Matrix’, with all the positives and negatives that implies: the pay-off for set-pieces that brazenly defy the accepted laws of physics is a certain ponderousness coupled with a lingering odour of intellectual self-importance.
That said, it tacks far closer to the path of ’The Matrix’ than that film’s creatively bankrupt sequels, and there’s an element of playfulness that sits easily with the metaphysical mumbo-jumbo, as if Christopher Nolan and collaborators rubbed their hands in glee at the thought of the reams of virtual paper that the internet would, inevitably, devote to decoding every last nuance of the film.
However, whether you take this as playfulness or as pompous sophistry, there is a case that Inception is too clever for its own good. It is difficult to avoid spoilers, suffice to say that it is over-fond of ambiguity, and the result is film as puzzle: the impression (and it’s difficult to escape the feeling that this is deliberate) is that if you watch it enough times you can piece together enough of the clues to work it all out. This sense of the film as a game further removes the viewer from emotional connection with its characters.
Moving further into spoiler territory, a good comparison (and you’ll have to bear with me on this) is ‘Total Recall’. Both are, basically action films (though ‘Inception’ is a shade more the sort of heist movie which, based on the opening scene of ‘Dark Knight’, Nolan clearly loves) and both finish on a note of ambiguity. However, for ‘Total Recall’ this is little more than a juicy post-script which has no bearing or effect on the rollicking 2 hours that precede it. You can enjoy this as a cheesy Arnie action-fest and also appreciate the little hint at the end that it might all be a fantasy (indeed, in some ways this postscript gives you the option of viewing the whole thing as a satrical deconstruction of action movies. But I digress). With Inception the twist ‘is’ the film: the whole narrative drive of the movie is a puzzle tied into its last few seconds.
To draw another analogy, for years fans of ‘Blade Runner’ debated whether Deckard was or was not a replicant. The answer to this question did not make a substantive difference to the narrative (events still unfolded in the way they were presented to us). In ‘Inception’ the answer to the question posed by the ending dictates the course and meaning of the narrative almost entirely.
Ironically, in aiming high as a thinking-person’s action film, ‘Inception’ ends up rather one-dimensional – a cold logic puzzle rather than a boisterous rush of emotion. Doubly ironic in that we are told the subconscious at the heart of the film’s core mechanic is motivated purely by emotion.
Some people will revel in this, and fair enough.* The profusion of essays, tweets and the like that have poured out online are often thoughtful and make good points. There’s even close analysis of the score on youtube, and the meaning which that lends to the film. It’s also very well made, and while Nolan will never be one of the great action directors, he’s come on a long way since the turgid car chase of ’Batman Begins’.
Casting is fine, despite my personal prejudice against Leonardo Di Caprio. Pick of the bunch for me was Tom Hardy, especially his brilliant bickering double-act with Joseph Gordon-Levitt. The script is good, special effects are lovely, the central conceit is great. All very nice.
However, and I know this is churlish and – in light of recent Hollywood drek – incredibly ungrateful, I can’t escape the notion that it thinks a little bit too much, and in doing so strips away some of the joy that makes a good action blockbuster REALLY good.
*Personally I reckon the title actually refers to an act of inception perpetrated against the audience – the idea that Cobb is dreaming the events of the whole movie is planted in the viewer’s mind throughout. More can be read at my blog and my twitter feed… or perhaps I can interest you in a pamphlet?
