Fantastic Films: Inception

The movies have been a popular form of entertainment for an extremely long time and I felt they are deserving enough for their own monthly segment. The segment, "Fantastic Films," will be about all kinds of films, old and new, that I feel that you should check out and watch right after you finish reading this post. For the first segment, I was thinking about any current movies out in the theaters that I felt you should go check out. I have already discuss and analyzed my thoughts about the final film in the Harry Potter series and felt that I've talked enough about my take on it. The next time I will be talking about anything HP will be in my "Ten Best Books I Read In 2011" and "Movies I Watched From 2011" posts at the end of the year. As for a movie I feel you should go and watch right now, I will suggest that you relive the most excellent film from the summer of 2010, Inception. I reviewed it before on Facebook and I will review it again on Caponomics.

Christopher Nolan, the genius behind Batman Begins, The Dark Knight, and the upcoming film, The Dark Knight Rises, decided to stray away from his Batman genius and create another masterful picture that we know as Inception. Leonardo DiCaprio plays Dom Cobb, whose job is to plant dreams into others, working with his partner Arthur (played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt). He's one project away from being able to return home and see his children, which is to plant a dream into a subconscious mind, in an act called "inception," hence the name of the film. Each of these figures has an object that represents whether or not they are performing in the dream, Dom's happens to be a spinning top. Keep in mind that the spinning top plays a very important role in the film and that you should pay close attention to it... and that's all I'm going to say about that. Cobb's main hurdle is his dead wife, who often stands in the way of his efforts and interferes in the way of past memories.

The next thing you should pay attention to in the film is the flight, which is where the act of the creation of the dream begins. This way, you will know that this is the base to where the dream begins and that from here on out, this is a dream. However, the dream world is very confusing, especially when you are dreaming within a dream. When watching the film, I was on the edge of my seat, carefully following scene after scene after scene. If you don't look closely enough, it'll be just like a fast treadmill, you are going to fall right off.

I only watched this film once and I have yet to master the entire plot of the film, but watching the film once made me fall in love with the concept, the characters, the settings, the plot, and everything else in between. This film was a gem, something that you don't see while you're in theaters everyday. It's not one of those B-rate, action packed, 3D, comic book superhero films that are dominating the box office these days. This is a film that concentrates more on a goal and the concept of a dream within a dream, and casts Leonardo DiCaprio, a fine actor indeed, as its center character. I also felt that Ellen Page, who played the center character in Juno, did an excellent job as Ariadne, who was the architect of the dream. Page has to be one of my favorite actresses of this time period and I look forward to seeing her in more upcoming films. As for DiCaprio and his character, Dom Cobb, he has a character that you really feel for and for the pain that he struggles with from losing his wife.

I will absolutely have to take the opportunity to watch this film again. Maybe by doing this, I will become a student of the film and of the concept of a dream within a dream. While others may ultimately lose patience to this concept, the film has such beautiful scenery and a story of a genius of the craft of inception who is given this assignment and we see him at work. This is easily one of the two favorite films that I watched in 2010 (the other being The King's Speech) and I will most definitely take the opportunity to watch this film again if such an opportunity is granted. Maybe I should go get a top as well and watch it spin, though I doubt I can spin it as well as Cobb.