9/10, really? Must be some sort of flocking behavior

Rating: 7/10 (31 January 2011)

Inception is an interesting movie without a doubt (refer to one of the countless other reviews for why that is). What I am going to focus on is why I think it's not a 9/10 which is what the IMDb voters on average have given it. I will also make the presumption you have seen the movie, as it's not productive to repeat the plot. The second reason is because a fair amount of time has gone since I saw the movie (twice), and although that means I've had lots of time to think it through, I don't remember all the details.
First, let me state the most immediate reason to why I didn't like the movie that much: The second half of the movie is a long string of bog standard action sequences. Yes, it's trying to be tense, but it doesn't manage to surprise me one bit - the ending is nearly completely predictable. Throughout, I care about only a few of the characters, and about none of the endless imaginary minions they are facing. If this fairly large flaw had been absent, the movie would at least have been a 9/10 for me.
Now for the more subtle problems: I feel that not enough was done to emphasize that the mission takes place in a dream world. Most of the time, the movie's "dream" world is indistinguishable to the real world. This similarity is intended (it is argued that the dreamer otherwise would become suspicious and wake up, or reject inception). Unfortunately, it means there are few chances to surprise us... That's where we return to "bog standard action sequences": Sure there are a few cool twists that illustrate the characters are in a dream, like the city being turned upside down; but these devices are for the most part absent once the inception mission starts, and thus have minor impact in total.
Obviously, this movie defies all physical laws, which would be okay if there is an alternative set of rules to cover for reality. It doesn't have such a coherent rule set however; instead, it is mostly reminiscent of movies where anything convenient is made up for whatever is supposed to be happening on screen. The bad guys perform wildly differently depending on whether the protagonists are supposed to be able to escape or not, rules for various dream levels diverge too much, and so on. In short, the script fails to lend itself credibility - one cannot simply say "it's a dream, we don't have to care about plausibility".
Aside from more than a few inconsistencies and 'too implausible to be believable'-facts, is is noticeable the background story/universe is mostly invented from scratch for this film. Perhaps it would have benefited Inception if a clearer connection to some existing religious or other fantasy theme had been made. We can only speculate for now, but I do hope someone decides to make another movie with the "entering dreams of others" theme with stronger ties to some existing mythology.
All in all, these complaints are pretty minor (except for the aforementioned way Inception attempts too much to be an action/thriller movie towards the latter parts). I'm giving it 7/10, since it made me stare at my watch several times to determine when I would no longer have to endure more clinical action sequences without substance.