The Self's Journey of Forgiveness

Rating: 10/10 (9 March 2015)

*** Spoilers****
It's about the power of an idea to take hold over an individual. Cobb has been trapped by his belief he is responsible for his wife's death and he is constantly punishing himself for it. Cobb's one goal then is to get back to the United States and see his children, but he is forbidden to do so, why? Because he is punishing himself.
When the movie begins Cobb washes onshore in Japan he is already dreaming when he sees his children on the beach. Cobb then meets Saito in Limbo. One of Saito's most memorable lines is, "an old man, filled with regret, waiting to die alone."
Also is Edith Piaf's song, "Non, je ne regrette rien" translates as "No, I regret nothing." Letting go of the guilt Cobb feels for what he has done to his family is the story of the movie. (I kind of think this song is being played to Cobb while he is sleeping to help him forgive himself as a kind of meta-inception.)
Therefore everyone involved in the mission of Inception is part of Cobb's psyche. He has to destroy the superstructure of these false beliefs, the guilt he feels for Mal's death, before he can be set free. That the totem falls or not is unimportant. That the totem behaves differently then before is very important. This signifies a profound change for Cobb at the end of the movie.