I admired Inception, but I didn't love it.
I'm a big Christopher Nolan fan and one of my favorite movies of all time is Memento.
To me, he's one of those guys whose movies are always worth checking out to see what he's doing.
I agree with Steve that there is a very interesting premise at the center of this film, but that premise is one that you think through, which, IMO, is the result of faulty story telling.
Nolan works double and triple time making up for the lack of interest we have in these characters. He's got plot coming out of his wazoo and man that's gotta hurt. He's got three and four overlapping, cutting slapping, zing-pow editing plots going sometimes.
Is it a film or a graduate course in film comprehension? It's two candy mints in one and it's a lot of work. By the end, I felt like my brain had gone 15 rounds with Mike Tyson. I checked both ears to make sure they were still intact. I like cerebral movies, but I like to do my thinking after the movie is over. When this movie was over, I wanted to turn my mind off and give it a rest.
Part of the problem, IMO, is that the premise is what is called "on the nose" rather than employing symbolism, metaphor or allegory.
This means the premise and all of it's rules, definitions, by-laws, and everything else has to be spelled out for you with tons of expositional dialogue. I'll give you an example of what I mean. Let's pick one everyone will know. In Star Wars, Obi Wan tells Luke to "use the force." We all get very intuitively what he means so he does not have to spell it out. In fact, it is ambiguous enough that we can also project something of our own onto the concept. This has the effect something like holding a mirror up to another mirror. Yo get meanings bouncing off each other and you just understand it -- you don't need a notebook by your side to keep it all together.
Take another one; Blade Runner. The replicants have several problems. These problems are all metaphors for the human condition and once again, after you hear them described, you're off to the races. When the film is over, you can think about all of the various themes as long or as little as you like. It's the mirror effect.
Inception asks the question, "where do ideas originate?" Then, it answers that question. Interesting question, interesting answer and I give Nolan all the credit in the world for taking the question and turning it into a non-stop action film. But, there's no intuitive feel, no metaphor, no mirror effect. These aren't really characters, they're vessels of information needed to explain the concepts. The closest Nolan comes to meaningful symbolism is when the characters take an elevator to the basement to get to Di Caprio's repressed (bad) memories. It's a pretty worn out cliche', but at least it was a visual way to illustrate a concept.
This is the problem when you don't employ allegory, symbolism, or metaphor. You have to spell everything out in concrete detail and that has the opposite of the mirror effect. It means everything is literal and that's a dead end.
As for DiCaprio. I had the same hard time with him in this film as I do in most of his other ones. He's a fine technical actor, but no matter how old he gets, he seems like a kid trying to act like an adult. I just don't get the feel of any life experience in his eyes or face. I'm too aware of the actor. To me, he doesn't really inhabit his characters. It doesn't help that they keep casting the kid in these world weary roles. But, he's got tons of fans, so it may just be my problem.
I'm glad I saw Inception. I have a feeling this may be the way films are going. The younger generation with their cell-phones, face book, and Twitter are used to participating in several realities at once and this movie seems paced to their metronome. Probably why younger people had an easier time following it. This kind of stimulation overload is closer to normal for them.
I'm a big Christopher Nolan fan and one of my favorite movies of all time is Memento.
To me, he's one of those guys whose movies are always worth checking out to see what he's doing.
I agree with Steve that there is a very interesting premise at the center of this film, but that premise is one that you think through, which, IMO, is the result of faulty story telling.
Nolan works double and triple time making up for the lack of interest we have in these characters. He's got plot coming out of his wazoo and man that's gotta hurt. He's got three and four overlapping, cutting slapping, zing-pow editing plots going sometimes.
Is it a film or a graduate course in film comprehension? It's two candy mints in one and it's a lot of work. By the end, I felt like my brain had gone 15 rounds with Mike Tyson. I checked both ears to make sure they were still intact. I like cerebral movies, but I like to do my thinking after the movie is over. When this movie was over, I wanted to turn my mind off and give it a rest.
Part of the problem, IMO, is that the premise is what is called "on the nose" rather than employing symbolism, metaphor or allegory.
This means the premise and all of it's rules, definitions, by-laws, and everything else has to be spelled out for you with tons of expositional dialogue. I'll give you an example of what I mean. Let's pick one everyone will know. In Star Wars, Obi Wan tells Luke to "use the force." We all get very intuitively what he means so he does not have to spell it out. In fact, it is ambiguous enough that we can also project something of our own onto the concept. This has the effect something like holding a mirror up to another mirror. Yo get meanings bouncing off each other and you just understand it -- you don't need a notebook by your side to keep it all together.
Take another one; Blade Runner. The replicants have several problems. These problems are all metaphors for the human condition and once again, after you hear them described, you're off to the races. When the film is over, you can think about all of the various themes as long or as little as you like. It's the mirror effect.
Inception asks the question, "where do ideas originate?" Then, it answers that question. Interesting question, interesting answer and I give Nolan all the credit in the world for taking the question and turning it into a non-stop action film. But, there's no intuitive feel, no metaphor, no mirror effect. These aren't really characters, they're vessels of information needed to explain the concepts. The closest Nolan comes to meaningful symbolism is when the characters take an elevator to the basement to get to Di Caprio's repressed (bad) memories. It's a pretty worn out cliche', but at least it was a visual way to illustrate a concept.
This is the problem when you don't employ allegory, symbolism, or metaphor. You have to spell everything out in concrete detail and that has the opposite of the mirror effect. It means everything is literal and that's a dead end.
As for DiCaprio. I had the same hard time with him in this film as I do in most of his other ones. He's a fine technical actor, but no matter how old he gets, he seems like a kid trying to act like an adult. I just don't get the feel of any life experience in his eyes or face. I'm too aware of the actor. To me, he doesn't really inhabit his characters. It doesn't help that they keep casting the kid in these world weary roles. But, he's got tons of fans, so it may just be my problem.
I'm glad I saw Inception. I have a feeling this may be the way films are going. The younger generation with their cell-phones, face book, and Twitter are used to participating in several realities at once and this movie seems paced to their metronome. Probably why younger people had an easier time following it. This kind of stimulation overload is closer to normal for them.