Inception Review

4.5 out of 5

Director: Christopher Nolan
Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Elliot Page, Marion Cotillard, Tom Hardy, Ken Watanabe, Cillian Murphy, Michael Caine
Released: July 16, 2010
Rated: PG-13
Runtime: 148 min

Action, Sci-Fi, Thriller

The Verdict

Thumbs Up: Highly Recommended

Anyone who loves a mind-bending blockbuster you’ll want to talk about afterward. It’s rated PG-13 for violence and action throughout.

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Synopsis

Dominick “Dom” Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) is a very skilled thief who’s the master of “extraction”, a new way of getting top secret information while someone is dreaming. He performs these extractions with his trustworthy partner named Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt). One day he is approached by a wealthy businessman named Saito (Ken Watanabe) about a risky job. This job involves the idea of “inception”, a new and dangerous type of skill.

Spoiler Warning!!! Full Review Below

Full Review (Spoilers)

Producers: Christopher Nolan

The Good

The plot for this movie was amazing. It had a great mix between reality and the dream world. After watching the movie for a while it all started to blur together. You could fully immerse yourself in this movie.

The plot twist of Dom using Inception Mal really surprised us. All during the movie you’re lead to believe she’s a bad character when it’s just the guilt of Dom using his wife as an experiment.

The idea of the multilevel dream worlds was a fresh take to this genre. We especially like the way how the time spent in each level.

The cast altogether was a great choice and they all performed remarkably. Cotillard and DiCaprio’s performances in this movie would take your breathe away. They both played very layered characters.

The visual effects for this movie was top notch. Each dream world was visually appealing. The thought of manipulating computer generated gravity blended well with each sequence.

The Bad

The open end with the top lead to a lot of speculation about the end of the movie. You would wonder is Cobb in Limbo or did he actually make it out safely? They should have made the ending definitive.

It was hard to tell who was the main dreamer in some of the sequences. The thought of the dreamer’s subconscious projections attacking the trespassers seem a bit too harsh. The first time noticing this was with Ariadne and Cobb. His projections just started to attack her and Mal finished it with a violent stab. Ariadne brought up a great question when Cobb is killing projections. She asked “are you destroying those parts of his mind?”, which brings up a great point. If the projections are part of the dreamer’s subconscious then it should be parts of their mind. It should do some kind of damage to the dreamer.

Originally published on the Bring On The Reviews Blogspot blog on April 10, 2014.

Inception (2010) Cast and Details

Inception (2010) is directed by Christopher Nolan and stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Elliot Page, Marion Cotillard and Tom Hardy. It runs 148 minutes and is rated PG-13. You can look up the full cast and crew on IMDb. You might also like my Captain America: The Winter Soldier review.

DC's Hypothetical Corner

Let’s say I change one thing. Maybe that one thing will make this movie better or more watchable.

It would be a different movie if Mal didn’t die. It would change the movie completely. She really messed up everything when it came to the missions. The projection of Mal just seemed like she was out for revenge at any cost. Just picture this movie with Haley Joel Osment as Cobb saying “I see dead people”, too easy? Maybe add in Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes for a dramatic twist to the movie.

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