[Movie] Inception - Page 17

1) It's also about being a part of something great. What is our purpose in life? Some people live for money. Some people live for their family/friends. Some people live for achievements and passing some bar or goal that they have set for themselves. Most people mix these around, but a lot of people, at the core, live for one of these things, at least in my opinion. There's probably other things that people live for, but these are the main things, I think. So the whole "motive" is that, you're doing something that has never been done before. You're accomplishing something that is great, and you're making a step toward advancement. So the protagonists DO have a reason to be involved in the plan (other than pay) - it's the awe and the rush they get from being a part of something that big. You see a bit of this in Saito - he's not along "for the ride" or anything. He wants to be a part of it. Same with Arthur - though he's not completely convinced, he's not going to sit it out. And same with the chemist guy - Yusuf? - he had no problem with joining the crew because he's already in that mindset, that he wants to live life and do whatever is exciting. The concrete reasons given could be better, but ultimately, I don't have a problem with it.

Ariadne was new. She may have been extremely brilliant, but she wasn't about to stop the leader from going on his own mission. Also, she probably wanted to help him more than anything. She went in to protect the others, but also to help him, as she does in the end. As for Cobb, how often do you see someone pull themselves out of their only chance of returning home? Yes, he's extremely selfish in that he wants to return home and that is the reason why he's doing all of this. But I mean, would you expect him to be completely selfless? Toward the end, we start to see his confusion between dreams and reality - he himself is not sure of what is real (Mal is the voice of his doubts) and he believes that going home and seeing his children will help him grasp reality.

3) I mean, the way I think about the ending is that, it really was reality. But at the same time, the director couldn't have really done anything else if he wanted to express that we're not supposed to know. If he cuts the movie before if starts slowing down, everyone would think that it was all a dream. If he lets it slow down a bit, there's the possibility (and most likely) that it is reality. By physics, you could argue that it had to be reality, and so the director was silly by leaving it up. It they just let it fall, it would have been much better, because it would be absolute. So yea, I sort of agree with you, but I think the director wanted to leave the "possibility" to the die-hard people that it was a dream.

4) ? It wasn't a romance at all. lol, have you ever seen a romance? It was definitely a drama/thriller. Of that I have no question. Action is more like Transformers/Ironman/Predators, which like, there's a plot, but really it's just about the explosions and stuff. This is very obviously a drama/thriller, with an intense plot and all that. Shutter Island is very similar (I saw it recently) I think, in terms of genre.

5) Eh, I disagree with you. I'd give it at least a 4.5/5. And to be honest, I never go into movies with any expectations at all. That way I can judge more accurately and I can never get disappointed.




I think it's more that Saito was in danger of dying. A pretty obvious wound, whereas the others all remained unharmed. It's pretty lol that no one else ever gets shot when they're fighting the security on the other levels but w/e.

The difference is that one is affecting the environment, and one is affecting the actual person I guess. Outside-in vs. inside-out?

1. I never thought of it that way, that the protagonists were in it for the thrill of the adventure. I have never met anyone who would risk everything they have just for an adrenaline rush, but I guess that could have been because from being able to access dreams whenever they want, so nothing else is exciting. I guess it just feels completely irrational to me that someone would live and behave in such a destructive manner for the thrills. I mean, they weren't only going into the dream and destroying projections, they were destroying millions of jobs and commerce. Irrational in my opinion, but understandable.

As for Cobb, do you sympathize for him? His hell is self created after all, yet he still risks everyone around him to escape. You could actually see him as the antagonist and Mal as the protagonist if you really looked deep into it, it's not just mere selfishness. He gave up eternity with his wife for "real life," and then he realized it was a mistake, and Mal died in the process. She died out of her love for the fake world of their's, while he lived for the real world which neither of them could really belong to. Personally, I think I would have chosen the dream as Mal did, even if she only did it subconsciously.

3. Well no I understand the ending, I was just unsatisfied with it. I think it would have been more definitively ambiguous had Cobb's father knocked it over while the camera panned to it, instead of leaving sides of people saying that it looked like it was going to fall or that it wasn't.

4. It was most definitely partially a romance, half of the story was about the love between Cobb and Mal. It may not be The Notebook incarnate, but neither is Vanilla Sky and I still view that as a romance. It's just the story of how love ripped them apart in the end instead of brining them together, which I think is more emotionally effective than The Notebook or most other traditional American romances. I guess thats what a drama would be though, because it's not very "romantic," but what ever, it's really just cutting hairs. The point I was trying to make is that I couldn't find a central point of the movie to focus on, while there were three (in my opinion romance, thriller, action) presented. Romance being the love between Mal and Cobb, thriller being the thrill of being in a dream/the idea of the movie as a whole, and action of course being all of the gunfire and explosions.

5. I should really take up your advice on not having expectations, but it's difficult when I surround myself with such trustworthy and competent people ^.^

(1) If Saito was in Limbo for 50 years, wouldn't much more than ten hours have passed in real life? I understand that time passes differently in the dream world, but if I recall correctly, weeks should have passed instead of just ten hours. If this is truly the case, then it would indicate that Cobb was dreaming at the end after all.

(2) Who removed all of the equipment from everybody when they woke up on the plane? Did the stewardess remove it as they started to come to? Did the other members of the group wake up earlier?

for 2: the stewardess helped them set up so... im guessing she helped take everything down

was in Limbo, which could be in essence a fourth level where time passes much much slower as in the third level where 10 hours would mean 10 years. The fourth level would be much more than that.

Free fall in level 1 leads to no gravity in level 2.
Why doesn't no gravity in level 2 lead to no gravity in level 3?

Yea, that's a valid point. I read up on it, and apparently weightlessness = free fall in terms of how it feels, so every level beyond first should have been weightless.

But it all depends on the dreamer. If the dreamer were somehow trained to be used to weightlessness or just tried really hard to to "weightful" then their dream would be that way.

Also, the fact that Saito's pain was reduced in successive levels of the dream might suggest that the weightlessness was also reduced.. Maybe..

The way I understood it is this way

Level 1: accelerating down-wards --> forces weightlessness
Level 2: weightless, but they aren't accelerating. Therefore, the next level is normal.

Kind of wish they had more chase-like scenes with the dream defenders or whatever. Like they introduced this whole concept of mazes and stuff but never played them out.. in the city the guys drives around and is caught multiple times anyways, in the hotel there's really no chase at all just a fight, and in the snow place is there a maze at all? Or just a giant field of snow.

Also, why did Ariadne have to tell Cobb about the vent system? She could just tell Saito and Fischer.. and not have Cobb's subconscious know..

The messed up gravity fight scenes were cool.

Kind of seemed like they messed up track of time? I mean when Yusef was driving around they got nothing done.. in the 10 seconds that he was falling they got so much more done.. i was like wtf?

But yeah, overall, I think they could have made the chase scenes more epic. imo the resistance didn't seem very heavy, lol.

I have a question, can you remember what you dreamed in level 2 and upwards once you are awake to reality? In the end of the movie, at the checking point in the airport, Fischer was looking at cobb, did he recognize cobb from level 2 in the hotel room?
My take is in the movie, one can only remember what happened in their dream on the first level, so Fischer didn't recognize cobb in reality because, in the first level (the van), Fischer never saw cobb's face. But he did see saito's face I believe, wouldn't that make Fischer feel suspicious?

Also here is my take on the effect of the "kick" in each dream levels:
level 1: if you are dead in level 1, you go back to reality unless you are on sedative then you go in to limbo. (example: Ariadne and Cobb in the testing dream when Cobb was explaining to her about architecture in the dream world, everything explodes and glass shards kills Ariadne and wakes her.)
level 2: if you are dead in level 2, you go back to level.
example: Arthur killed by Cobb in the "party" at the beginning of film, Arthur wake up in level 1.
level 3: Same, to level 2
level 4: Same, to level 3, Fischer jumped and went back to level 3.
Limbo: If you die, base on the different interpretations of the ending, you either wake up in reality or to another dream level.

They can't remember anything from the dreams specifically because the dreams are so "deep". That is how inception works is the idea grows it isn't just implanted there. Most of the time in the movie they answer this question with the fact of trying to remember a dream, after dreaming. It's very difficult and like you said they would probably only remember parts of the first level.

I tend to agree with you on this, but then it seems that Cobb knows too much of what was going on in the dreams once he came back to "reality". How did he remember that he made an inception on Mal in the limbo, since it is believed that no one suppose to remember anything in the limbo, that is why the inception on Mal worked. Cobb was so crystal clear of what was going on in multiple levels of dreams that made me believe everything happened in the movie was in his dream after all.

They go into the "4th level" (I'm assuming this is limbo?) , Mal dies, they save Fischer, and then Cobb stays to "find Saito" since Saito is in limbo (somehow they know Saito died). Is there just one general limbo, or are people's limbos different? How would Saito be in the limbo of Cobb (since they went into Cobb's dream, ended up in his world, etc) ... how was he there??

He wakes up on the shore (AGAIN), suggesting that he went into ANOTHER dream (a 5th level?) , how else would he have gotten from the house with Mal to the shore of a beach where Saito was. Wouldn't he have had to go into Saito's dream to be in his limbo?

And when Cobb finds Saito in limbo, why is only Saito old?

I believe fourth stage was NOT limbo. Just very very unstable? Beach area was limbo --> which is why Saito was in there for so long. Not positive however.