The best dream I ever had ...

Rating: 10/10 (1 August 2010)

Finally here is a movie to wake us up from a really bad movie year. This was the most anticipated film this year for me. I was so excited for over one year before it came out and most of my expectations were satisfied.
Christopher Nolan has worked on the script for "Inception" for about 10 years. It's the first film he is responsible for the story and of course directing all by himself since his debut "Following" from 1998 (which is worth seeking out if you haven't seen that one yet).
Regarding his former credits including one of my all time favorite films - Memento -, The Prestige and The Dark Knight it is nearly unbelievable how consistent Nolan is with his projects. One better than the other and this is another true original.
Inception deals with the theme of dreams in a complex and artful fashion and manages to mix a sophisticated, challenging idea with an action heist movie plot that leaves you breathless. Still in my opinion with the action Nolan "sadly" did make a step too much to please the mainstream audience and segments become a bit too much of an above-average chase movie that kinda ignore the great ideas that definitely are implied in the picture or at least in these action parts (especially the Rocky-Mountains-Snow sequence which is probably the weakest part of the movie) it doesn't make use of its full potential. It should have been a bit more mysterious and not that orderly for some parts, though Nolan stated he wanted to keep it as real as possible and I respect that. For that matter Nolan does a great job filming many many scenes on set, in camera, not using CGI all the time. We see a real set shifting 25 degrees, and fights in "zero gravity". Visually astounding scenes we liked to see more of compared to the huge content of standard (though well made) action movie shoot outs.
It may be not perfect but Inception is still a very good movie.
The world it creates is epic. The cast is very good and so is the score. The story is still kind of confusing at times and there are still some questions left for me to answer.
The theme of dreams is laid out so interesting in many aspects it may not only make you discuss this picture but also dreams in general.
Inception is like a wonderful dream that may not come true in the end.
I am not certain if Inception is a masterpiece, but I really think this is gonna be better the second time around and after that I'll see. I have to admit I still prefer "Memento" as Nolans outlandishly clever masterpiece.
EDIT: I've seen it a second time now and I think the movie did not quite improve or even hold up to the first time. This is NOT a masterpiece but anyway:
Inception is hands down the best movie I've seen this year.
9/10