Deception?

Rating: 2/10 (21 December 2011)

"Inception" is nothing more than a stupid, high-concept movie with an ideal target audience of geeky 14 year old boys who have little interest in the opposite sex. It's hard to believe therefore that this film has an average IMDb rating of 8.9 and has received such ecstatic levels of praise on this site.
So, why don't I think that it is any good? Firstly, what is it "about"? What are it's themes? Genuinely great contemporary film makers of the rational world , such as Michael Haneke, explore the fundamental elements of human experience and modern society. Haneke has explored the failure of communication, the influence of media, the difficulties of multi-culteralism, the survival of humanity and culture, the impact of violence etc etc. In comparison "Inception" has no themes or original ideas. The most interesting visual moments are lifted from a variety of sources ranging from "2001" to James Bond. The basic narrative consists of the struggle to make one huge corporation slightly bigger than another. Where is the human element in that? Where are the morals? Where is the redemption? The Capitalist system is helping the extremely rich get richer – the wealth of the richest 1% has doubled over the last 10 years – but do ordinary office workers and blue collars workers, who are getting screwed by the system, care whether one faceless giant corporation overcomes another? Where is the drama when you don't care about the outcome and don't care about the characters? It's a film that has no philosophical or human dimension. Indeed the treatment of the "Mal" character and the failure to have her impose some sense of human or emotional responsibility on the Cobb character show the film to actually be as morally bankrupt as the casino bankers. Human emotion and relationships are overlooked by boys who are in thrall to their CGI toys.
Does it achieve what it sets out to deliver so far as atmosphere and tone are concerned? That great modern film maker of the subconscious world, David Lynch, has shown us that Cinema can show the dreams and nightmares of the human psyche, can show the "other world" that lives just below the tangible surface. But "Inception" use of dream states and the "dream within a dream" is extremely mundane. Comparing a work of genius, such as "Mulholland Drive", with this pedestrian fantasy demonstrates what a failure in atmosphere there is in this film. "Inception" is also completely lacking in sex. How can you have a film about dream states and the subconscious that is as flat and banal as this? Perhaps Christopher Nolan isn't comfortable in exploring this area? That might explain why he has agreed to cast Anne Hathaway, surely one of the least sexy leading ladies in modern cinema ( unless you get excited by the 11 year old/"Bambi" look ) as sex icon Catwoman in his upcoming "The Dark Knight Rises". You just know all of the curves on this Catwoman are going to be part of the suit and as fake as the "philosophy" in "Inception"! I've enjoyed several of Nolan's earlier films and I think "Memento" in particular is a fascinating film and a film that actually DOES have themes - of identity, memory and guilt. However, I think his move into the world of "intelligent Blockbusters" ( as if there can be such a thing!? ) have made him lose his way.
The cast are uniformly flat in their performances. Some excellent performers such as Cillian Murphy, Marion Cotillard, Pete Postlethwaite etc are wasted in underdeveloped roles. At the core of the film is the perpetually furrowed brow and dead eyes of Leonardo Di Crapio. Indeed, one of the great mysteries of the modern cinema age is what, once great, filmmaker Martin Scorsese sees in this rubber faced, bland, not particularly intelligent presence. That's not to say that great sci-fi can't be made with a not very bright leading man. The first "Matrix" film is a wonderful film despite the somewhat befuddled presence of Keanu. But it is a great film because it has ideas, human drama, personal politics and the subtext that "Inception" lacks.
The pacing throughout "Inception" is turgid, oh how I waited and waited for that white van to fall, and the po-faced self importance of the whole thing is laughable.
Now that the big corporations own the studios, the distribution and the cinemas the films that get force fed to the public are decided by air heads in suits. As a result the average audience's exposure to intelligent cinema is in serious decline. It's a shame that an essentially vacuous piece of escapism like "Inception" is being spoken of as being an intelligent piece of film making because if this is the future of "intelligent" cinema then, ladies and gentlemen, cinema is dead.