Everyone should see this original masterpiece

Rating: 9/10 (1 October 2010)

Oh Christopher Nolan, where would we be without you? Without your batman films we wouldn't live in a world of reboots, or in a world where classy Hollywood entertainment barely exists. To many film buffs, Nolan is worshipped like a god, and rightly so. Nolan is like an anomaly among Hollywood heavyweights, a young but old fashioned film maker who relies on a good cast and technical effects to bring a film to life, not a CGI junkie that 90 something % of all Hollywood directors are. His latest film 'Inception' could well be his most brilliant achievement yet. You have to be a damn well respected guy to influence Warner Bros into making a $160 million sci-fi film that almost no-one but Nolan himself understood, and with a marketing strategy that would shroud the film in mystery until release. Fortunately the gamble has paid off very well indeed, and Nolan has proved that successful original big budget entertainment is definitely possible in this day and age.
To someone who hasn't seen 'Inception', three words best describe it: dreams, heist, and ideas. The story follows a man called Dom Cobb (played by the great Leonardo Di'Caprio) who is the best in his field in the dangerous profession of Extraction, which is when someone enters someone else's mind through their dreams, and extracts secret information from influential people.
The opening of the film is when Cobb and his partner Arthur (the very talented Joseph Gordon Levitt) are performing an Extraction on a Japanese business man called Saito (Ken Watanabe), but things get a bit hairy when Cobb's sinister ex-wife Mallorie (a surprisingly unsettling Marion Cotillard) steps in and causes trouble, leading to an opening that is action packed but confusing on first viewing as the whole concept of the dream world hasn't been explained yet, but this is deliberate on Nolan's part who wants to reward the viewer by feeding them bits of information at a time.
Thanks to Mallorie the heist fails, and they all wake up back into the real world (or do they?!), and Saito reveals that he was actually testing Cobb, to see if he is good enough to perform the opposite of Extraction – Inception, which is planting information into another's mind instead of stealing it. Saito wants to implement Inception on Robert Fischer (Cillian Murphy, a veteran of Nolan's) who is the son of Saito's main business rival Maurice Fischer who is terminally ill, and the mission is to convince Robert to break up Fischer's empire. Cobb deems it impossible, but Saito convinces him by offering to clear his murder charges so that he can return to the U.S and see his children. Cobb goes through with it and starts to organizes a team that would have to be the best he has ever had. This leads him to Ariadne (Ellen Page) a young graduate student who he wants to play the role of the Architect whose job is to construct the dream worlds they will be entering. Ariadne acts as the connection with the audience, as she like us doesn't understand what the dream world is and its rules, leading to several scenes of explanation that informs both Ariadne and the audience. Cobb eventually forms his team, and the Inception begins on Robert Fischer and one of the most memorable on screen journeys I've ever seen unfolds, honestly you will be amazed.
Nolan always gets together a great cast, but he mostly uses their talents not their star power to use on screen, so much so that these famous actors are almost unrecognizable. This especially rings true with Leonardo Di'Caprio who is absolutely brilliant as Cobb, delivering his most mature and complex role yet. Cobb is the emotional centre of the story, a broken family man with a long and tragic history, and Di'Caprio is so convincing in the role, taking the audience by its hand and leading them on this mind bending journey. Ellen Page is equally convincing as Ariadne, she has the tough job of being the inexperienced member of Cobb's team, while most of the other supporting actors play characters that have much experience in the dream world so they don't have to show the range of emotions she does. As I said before Ariadne represents what the audience is feeling in this amazing dream world, and like us accompanies Cobb for nearly his entire personal journey. Marion Cotillard makes for a truly unique screen villainess, playing Cobb's deceased wife who haunts Cobb's dreams, and pops up now and then to sabotage his missions. She represents Cobb's anger and guilt for what he has done in the past,. Mallorie doesn't appear that much, but when she does she brings such menace, and later on in the film – sympathy. It's a great antagonistic role, but also offers a deep and rich love story. I would go into the rest of the cast, but I'm running out of words, though I will say Tom Hardy is a joy as Eames who brings charm and humor into the midst, also Cillian Murphy is very effective as Robert Fischer being a character you really feel for.
If you're an action fanatic and think the film sounds a bit art-house, don't worry there is plenty of action in the film, and some real jaw dropping moments. The stand out action scene has to be Arthur's fight with some goons in a room that's constantly rotating, its fantastic stuff and never been seen before. Hans Zimmer (Nolan's music maestro) has produced a very effective score that's understated and haunting; the film would be much less without it.
'Inception', isn't some small interlude between 'The Dark Knight' and Nolan's next Bat film, this is a very epic but fiendishly clever film, and I actually pity Nolan's next effort, Batman or not. Inception will bend your mind and stay with you long after the credits close. Do not miss!