Brilliant.

Rating: 9/10 (16 July 2010)

That word gets thrown around a lot - probably way too often, actually - when critics are trying to describe films they've particularly enjoyed, but halfway through "Inception," I realized there was really no other word to describe it. Even if you don't love the film (and it isn't quite flawless), purely on a conceptual level it's completely out there. This is one of those movies that comes along very rarely that assembles various film clichés, but spins them in such a new, fresh and exciting way that it feels like it's reinvented the wheel.
Like I said, it's certainly assembled from some basic stock clichés (Man Who Must Get Back His Kids, "Assemble Your Team," Dead Lover Whose Memory Haunts Hero, conceptual similarities to The Matrix and an action scene literally pulled right out of a James Bond movie, etc., etc., etc.,), the way Nolan pulls it all together is wholly unique. I have never seen a movie like this before. I was enthralled from beginning to end, and I totally understood why it took him ten years to finish this screenplay -- I mean, can you imagine keeping track of what's going on between all the various dream sequences? It'll be interesting to see what kind of goofs nerds with too much time on their hands pick out when it hits DVD.
Having said that, I feel it's short of perfect. For starters, Nolan still hasn't quite grasped the staging of an action sequence. He cuts around way too fast and you can't quite figure out what's going on. Sometimes it works -- I liked it in Batman Begins when he makes his first appearance and it's like an attack out of an alien movie because it's all edited incomprehensibly -- but I would have liked to get a better picture of that terrific fight Joseph Gordon-Levitt's character has during a particularly unique sequence. The way Nolan has edited this scene is so up-close and frantic that, even though it's still totally awesome, you kinda wish he'd pull back and let you get a clearer picture of the whole set and just watch it unfold. I felt the same way during the snowmobile chases and fight scenes -- just a bit too chaotic to keep up with. Sometimes it matches the frantic pace of the movie, but as with both Batman films (even though they were otherwise great movies), most of the time you get the feeling that he's just not comfortable with an action scene. He needs to get another editor who understands that element a bit better because he would otherwise be an almost limitless director.
Minor flaws that keep a 9/10 from being a 10/10. It's hard for me to knock Toy Story 3 down from my favourite film of '10, but for sheer originality this would win. It's definitely the second best film I've seen all year and, along with TS3, a standout from an otherwise dreary summer. Go see this if you've tired of brainless entertainments and welcome the idea of being able to talk about the film you've just seen on your way out of the theater instead of fishing for conversation starters.