Inception

Rating: 8/10 (29 July 2010)

From BAFTA and Golden Globe nominated director Christopher Nolan (Memento, Insomnia, The Dark Knight), this to me and I'm sure millions of other people was a much anticipated summer blockbuster, and I wasn't going to miss it. Basically Dominic 'Dom' Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) is a skilled thief who steals valuable secrets in dangerous extraction, he enters a person's subconscious in their dreams, when the mind is most vulnerable. He is troubled man however, haunted by the memory's of his past with wife Mallorie 'Mal' (Marion Cotillard) and their subconscious experiences, and he is dying to change his past via the dream state. Saito (Batman Begins' Ken Watanabe) is offering him the chance of redemption by carrying out one last job using the subconscious entry, an impossible mission called inception. This would involve entering the mind of Robert Fischer Jr. (Cillian Murphy), who has gained control of the company his recently deceased father Maurice (Pete Postlethwaite) owned, and placing in his mind the idea to shut down this company. So Cobb assembles a crack team of experts in the field of dream extraction and knowledge of inception, including Arthur ((500) Days of Summer's Joseph Gordon-Levitt), Ariadne (Juno's Ellen Page), Eames (Tom Hardy) and Yusuf (Dileep Rao). To make sure the mission can succeed they plan to go into a dream lasting ten hours, the length of Fischer's regular plane journey, and they will be going through three layers of dream state, i.e. dream within a dream within a dream. So the main dream is Fischer and his assistant Peter Browning (Platoon's Tom Berenger) caught as hostages, and Fischer is convinced Browning is keeping something about his father from him. Then the next dream is Fischer convinced by Cobb that someone is trying to get into his head for this big secret, and he agrees to go into a dream to find out what the big secret is. Of course the dream states collide with each other, so the main dream sees some car chases as distractions in the big maze, so gravity for example of the characters in sleep will come into play in the other dreams too. But also the big problem with Cobb being in the dream is that his thoughts are being projected into the dream as well, such as the appearance of his wife and kids, his wife even kills Fischer when they need him most, forcing Cobb to go into his own memory of dream. In the end, the big secret placed into Fischer's mind is that his father wanted him to go his own way and create another company, and Cobb manages to come out with Saito as themselves, and the past is changed for Cobb for the better. Also starring Sir Michael Caine as Miles and Witness's Lukas Haas as Nash. There is a thought hanging over you when you watch that you really have to concentrate, but at the same time it is quite easy to keep up with where you are. If you can keep up with it, like I did manage to, you are completely taken in by the great action sequences, the well chosen cast, the imaginative concept, and the brilliant special effects to make it all possible, a fantastic and cool science-fiction action thriller. It won the Oscars for Best Cinematography, Best Sound Editing, Best Sound Mixing and Best Visual Effects, and it was nominated for Best Motion Picture of the Year, Best Art Direction, Best Music for Hans Zimmer and Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen, it won the BAFTAs for Best Special Visual Effects, Best Production Design and Best Sound, and it was nominated for Best Film, the Anthony Asquith Award for Film Music, Best Cinematography, Best Editing and Best Original Screenplay, and it was nominated the Golden Globes for Best Motion Picture - Drama, Best Original Score and Best Screenplay. Leonardo DiCaprio was number 94 on The 100 Greatest Movie Stars. Very good!