Thoughts on Inception
Aug. 4th, 2010 08:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
melcharOkay, saw 'Inception' and have my own theories.
My bet it that the entire movie is done in dreamtime. The 'upper levels' of the dream were those most similar to the 'real' world. There were actual not-his-kids visible - a few older folks - money changed hands once and some people were goofing off. [the train scene, Paris & Customs after the flight.]
It seemed most likely to be a joint psychiatric intervension. Saito appeared to be the analyst for his charge [unhappy industrialist kid];
while Ariadne appeared to be there to help Cobb deal with his guilt.
The Ariadne problem is that I'm pretty sure she's a construct. Cobb goes to
Michael Caine's character Miles [his father-in-law/wife's dad]. Miles is supposed to be 'better at this' than Cobb is. He refers Cobb to Ariadne. We are shown that the dominant dreamer can duplicate themself - so either:
Ariadne is actually Miles in a naive girl-suit, helping Cobb make a breakthrough on his guilt and return to more normal functionality as a son-in-law, father to the grandkids -> or Ariadne is a 3rd Cobb persona - but one who can use his full resources and help him deal with his trauma/recover sanity.
So the story goes 1st scene is near the end, with most of film thus a flashback. Cobb goes from injured and waterlogged, talking with old Saito - to clean, healthy & coifed confronting younger Saito. 3 Saito scenes establish Saito as an epic manipulator and not really believable industrialist who then hires Cobb to go to work on [unhappy industrialist kid];
Cobb goes to Paris/Miles; meets Ariadne and then the rest of the film takes place in progressively deeper layers of dream - starting with the warehouse where they plan and practice. Browning is probed [and the scene from lawyer office thru door to huge medical room is SO not RL], the Mombasa stuff is WAY too coincidence-filled & Saito is like 'sure I hired out a whole 747'.
1st class airline scene at starting & ending establishes the interface between close to real world and even deeper dreaming. So from flight it's suddenly rainy city and van ride, with Saito being changed from participant to person in peril & in need of rescue.
The next layer down is the hotel [which is my absolute favorite scenes, because I loved the character of Arthur, his ingenuity and adaptability] ->
followed by a layer of frozen grief and defensiveness as [unhappy industrialist kid] has his breakthrough ->
the limbo layer is Cobb's deeper analysis where he confronts his grief and
overcomes it, pretty much on his own - because Ariadne becomes just a sounding board here. She's there to be spoken aloud to so that he can and admit his problems in a conscious fashion. This tends me to believe Ariadne is more a Cobb persona fragment, doing therapy to himself. She leaves with [recovering industrialist kid] & Cobb is left to find and rescue Saito.
Thus we return to the scene from the beginning. It is replayed, Saito and Cobb both are able to return to the upper dream layers of more normal functionality and the plane lands. There are significant glances exchanged in baggage claim - as clutter signals a closer approach to reality.
Michael Caine's character is there, past Customs & greets Cobb. Then there's an abrupt scene shift, Cobb gets to see his kids and the movie ends as the top wobbles. IMO it sure sounded like the top fell over as the movie went black.
To me the biggest plot hole is that while we are -shown- totems for some
characters, there is NEVER one shown for Cobb. The one he is using is his wife's totem. [And her name sure sounded as lot more like 'Moll', as in a gangster's female accomplice, than 'Mal' to me.] So if -he- doesn't have a totem, how can -he- check his own status when it comes to real life?
My bet it that the entire movie is done in dreamtime. The 'upper levels' of the dream were those most similar to the 'real' world. There were actual not-his-kids visible - a few older folks - money changed hands once and some people were goofing off. [the train scene, Paris & Customs after the flight.]
It seemed most likely to be a joint psychiatric intervension. Saito appeared to be the analyst for his charge [unhappy industrialist kid];
while Ariadne appeared to be there to help Cobb deal with his guilt.
The Ariadne problem is that I'm pretty sure she's a construct. Cobb goes to
Michael Caine's character Miles [his father-in-law/wife's dad]. Miles is supposed to be 'better at this' than Cobb is. He refers Cobb to Ariadne. We are shown that the dominant dreamer can duplicate themself - so either:
Ariadne is actually Miles in a naive girl-suit, helping Cobb make a breakthrough on his guilt and return to more normal functionality as a son-in-law, father to the grandkids -> or Ariadne is a 3rd Cobb persona - but one who can use his full resources and help him deal with his trauma/recover sanity.
So the story goes 1st scene is near the end, with most of film thus a flashback. Cobb goes from injured and waterlogged, talking with old Saito - to clean, healthy & coifed confronting younger Saito. 3 Saito scenes establish Saito as an epic manipulator and not really believable industrialist who then hires Cobb to go to work on [unhappy industrialist kid];
Cobb goes to Paris/Miles; meets Ariadne and then the rest of the film takes place in progressively deeper layers of dream - starting with the warehouse where they plan and practice. Browning is probed [and the scene from lawyer office thru door to huge medical room is SO not RL], the Mombasa stuff is WAY too coincidence-filled & Saito is like 'sure I hired out a whole 747'.
1st class airline scene at starting & ending establishes the interface between close to real world and even deeper dreaming. So from flight it's suddenly rainy city and van ride, with Saito being changed from participant to person in peril & in need of rescue.
The next layer down is the hotel [which is my absolute favorite scenes, because I loved the character of Arthur, his ingenuity and adaptability] ->
followed by a layer of frozen grief and defensiveness as [unhappy industrialist kid] has his breakthrough ->
the limbo layer is Cobb's deeper analysis where he confronts his grief and
overcomes it, pretty much on his own - because Ariadne becomes just a sounding board here. She's there to be spoken aloud to so that he can and admit his problems in a conscious fashion. This tends me to believe Ariadne is more a Cobb persona fragment, doing therapy to himself. She leaves with [recovering industrialist kid] & Cobb is left to find and rescue Saito.
Thus we return to the scene from the beginning. It is replayed, Saito and Cobb both are able to return to the upper dream layers of more normal functionality and the plane lands. There are significant glances exchanged in baggage claim - as clutter signals a closer approach to reality.
Michael Caine's character is there, past Customs & greets Cobb. Then there's an abrupt scene shift, Cobb gets to see his kids and the movie ends as the top wobbles. IMO it sure sounded like the top fell over as the movie went black.
To me the biggest plot hole is that while we are -shown- totems for some
characters, there is NEVER one shown for Cobb. The one he is using is his wife's totem. [And her name sure sounded as lot more like 'Moll', as in a gangster's female accomplice, than 'Mal' to me.] So if -he- doesn't have a totem, how can -he- check his own status when it comes to real life?
