I think too much (Inception - spoilers under cut tag)

[drwex]

We saw Inception last night. I generally liked it and I thought it was quite well done. It has more depth and complexity than most movies and does a great job of getting just the right amount of hand-wavey science stuff in to let you suspend disbelief without overdoing it. Everyone turns in a fine acting job and Chris Nolan does some really nice things with the camera to stretch and compress time as well as filming action sequences in ways that manage to be tense without excessive spatter.

There's just one problem:
(I have a side issue in that I saw the ending coming. I wasn't surprised, just disappointed. I do not want my movies to disappoint me in the end, especially when they're good all the way up to that point. But leave aside my personal disappointment for now.)

I believe that the ending implies that Cobb is still in a dream. The spinning top doesn't fall over. (ETA: most of the reviews I've read since seeing the movie seem to indicate that the top wobbles but you don't see it fall with the goal of creating ambiguity. I didn't see it that way, but I'll grant that others did.) If it doesn't fall, and Cobb is stuck in a dream that's problematic on three levels.

1. On a moral level Cobb is presented as the redeemed character. He confesses to his sin (incept'ing his wife), admits the source of his guilt, rejects the illusion she offers, and then makes a heroic sacrifice by staying behind to rescue Saito. If he's truly the redeemed character then leaving him trapped in an illusion is very unsatisfying on a Jungian level. It negates the power of what he's able to do in coming to terms with himself. You can't argue that he gets what he wants - if he had wanted the illusion of being with his children then he would have taken it any of the other times it was offered.

2. On a practical level I can't work out a sequence that leads to the conclusion shown in the movie. The fundamental question is how does Cobb GET to where he ends up? The last thing we're shown is him with Saito in the deepest level. How does he get to the sequence that begins with him waking up on the plane from where we last saw him?

I think two things are possible: either he succeeds or fails. If he succeeds in freeing Saito, presumably with the gun he brought in, then he ought to be able to get out by the same means. If he's out then he ought not to end up in a dream. If he's not out then he ought to be trapped in Saito's dream, not his. You can't hand-wave a third method in which he gets Saito out and then is somehow stuck himself because Saito is the inexperienced tourist. Cobb has been here, knows what he's doing, etc. If Saito's out then you need some mechanic to get Cobb into his own dream state.

The gun is also problematic since in theory his body is still under the effect of the narcotic that doesn't release you if you die. If you believe that dying in the dream is what got Saito into this mess in the first place then Cobb bringing a gun down with him makes no sense either.

Finally, even if nothing else, if you accept that Robert Fischer, Jr. wakes up then that should end the dream. If Fischer is awake whose dream is Cobb in? Remember that when he and Mal were down there in the first place it was their shared dream. When it ended they woke up.

3. Since neither outcome fits, this leaves us with the "and then what happens?" problem. In general when a story ends the reader/viewer should be able to tell you what happens next because the writer has put together a clear trajectory. If you can't do that then either the story stopped too soon (cliffhanger endings do this on purpose) or the story ending makes no sense. Inception is a movie with an ending that makes no sense.

If Cobb really does escape then he wakes up on the plane and the ending we saw is what happens in waking reality. (An argument can be made for that, since the children never turn to face him in his dreams and they do in the final sequence.) If he doesn't escape then neither does Saito, which means that Arthur, Ariadne, etc. all wake up on the plane with two catatonic bodies. And they do... what? Freak out? Run? Get arrested? Go back under and try to rescue both of them? The point is not that they could do any of these things - the point is that the story isn't ended if you don't know.

Comments

[shadesong.livejournal.com]

I like the wedding-ring theory (http://www.facebook.com/notes/bobby-roberts/so-heres-the-inception-discussion/412615121637).

Very maybe

[drwex]

I do think he's wrong about the Cobb-in-limbo ending working, as I noted.

He's also wrong about multiple people objecting to tourists. Only Cobb objects to him and only the once. He mentions being a tourist once, late in the movie.

Finally, I don't buy the double-incept theory. For that to work it would require that Miles (Caine's character) knows about inception (OK), knows how to do one (I don't buy that), and knows it well enough that he can teach a grad student how to do it - I don't buy that at all. The incept that is the core of the movie is complex and requires the entire team to plan and execute even with Cobb there who knows the most about it. I can buy that's she's a talented architect and someone who isn't afraid to speak her mind to Cobb but that's it. We have no evidence to support any of the rest of it.

All THAT said, I'm willing to buy the ring theory. However, not due to Nolan's filmic cleverness - there are plenty of goofs and shot errors in the film (see IMDB http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1375666/goofs). What I think is that Nolan having done Prestige before gives him the right background for this and I'll take misdirection as a deliberate behavior. Also, I instinctively like the idea of one more layer of cleverness than I originally discerned.

[selenite.livejournal.com]

That's fascinating, thanks.

[coraline]

i haven't seen it, but thought you might be interested in another friend's analysis...

[lifecollage.livejournal.com]

As someone who has seen it, I truly hope you haven't *read* any of these things if you were at all planning on watching it (which I do recommend). Because, as siderea says, they're not spoilery as much as they will point out things to you that are much more fun to notice on your own.

[coraline]

i very rarely watch movies, and even more rarely watch them in the theater, so i don't worry about spoilers. i'm likely to have forgotten them by the time i see the movie, if i ever do.

Thank you

[drwex]

That was an interesting review and I agree with many of the points she raises. In essence her review is "it would have been a better movie if he'd made _this_ movie instead of Inception." Which is probably true, but I'm not sure what to make of it.

[bluegargantua]

Alternate theory:

Cobb is unable to save Saito. At the penultimate scene, Saito is an old guy just sitting there and he seems pretty lost in the "reality" of limbo. The theory is that when you finally die in limbo, you wake up with your brain scrambled. If Saito comes out from limbo a drooling idiot, then Cobb is screwed (even if Cobb can get out with his mind intact). The authorities will arrest him when he goes through customs and he'll never see his kids again.

Cobb gives up. He caves into the dream of limbo and builds his idealized world where he can come home and be with his kids. This sort of makes sense if you consider that Cobb has done a lot of really reprehensible things. I mean, it's concealed well in the movie, but Cobb has been running around invading people's minds and stealing their very thoughts. If it were possible to do something like that for real, it'd probably be a crime punished like murder or worse (when governments weren't using it on their citizens). The movie is one of those crime tales where the criminal can't win/is hoist by his own petard.

The gun isn't that problematic. Cobb and Mal got out of limbo by killing themselves. Only they had that mantra so they would retain their sanity when they woke up. Cobb probably doesn't want to conjure a train up again.

later
Tom

I don't buy that; here's why

[drwex]

Saito's dialog indicates that he's been waiting for Cobb. He's an old man, but he clearly hasn't lost it. He remembers the top and seems to know what the gun is for. In order to argue that Cobb gives up you need some evidence. This is a guy who spends the whole movie singlemindedly pursuing his goal and at the end he suddenly gives up? I don't buy it.

Cobb has been running around invading people's minds and stealing their very thoughts. If it were possible to do something like that for real, it'd probably be a crime punished like murder or worse

Nobody involved in the enterprise is under any sort of criminal indictment for their dream espionage. One could argue that they OUGHT to be, but if you accept the movie's reality then they're not.

The gun isn't that problematic. Cobb and Mal got out of limbo by killing themselves.

True, but their bodies weren't under the effect of a heavy sedative. If death is the way out then Saito shouldn't have gotten stuck in limbo in the first place.

[emberwolfe.livejournal.com]

All good points. I loved the wedding ring theory posted above, I completely missed that! The wobble in the top at the end had me convinced that he was awake. That and the fact that he saw the children's faces, which never happened while he was dreaming because his subconsious did not want to see them.

What I have major problems with is that in dream 1 they are in freefall, dream 2 they are in freefall and dream 3 they are... completely grounded???? That bothered me to no end. Yes, I understand that time moves much slower in the third dream, however... wouldn't they still be lighter somehow? Maybe not completely spacewalking like in dream 2, but they sure hit the ground hard, avalanches and all for their physical bodies to be floating in two other dreams. That's where they lost me. But I still loved the film and would like to go see it again.

[harlequinaide.livejournal.com]

It goes much farther back than that. When Cobb goes under in India, testing the Good Stuff, he never gets to spin the top when he wakes up. Saito stopped him, and we never saw him spin the top again, after that. Thus, everything after India was a dream. None of it matters. They never went on the mission. The whole movie is one big fake-out. The guns and shooting and avalanches and blowing things up: all of it happened in Cobb's head, in India, and he kept building deeper dream-structures in his own dream, so that he could spend more time there.

Not only was I not impressed by the movie, the more I think about it the more annoyed I get with Nolan's misogyny. He can't direct women, his female characters are one-dimensional (it's a credit to Ellen Paige's acting that her character was at all interesting, frankly) and he always, always kills the women off to make his male characters "more interesting." He confuses "sulky" with "deep." Thanks to its being predictable, sexist and pointless, Inception will likely be the last Christopher Nolan movie I see.

As I said in another venue: Inception reminds me of a model I dated: really sexy in the moment, not as smart as it think it is, and (I can now add) increasingly less attractive the farther away I get.

Which woman does he kill off?

[drwex]

Although Mal is dead in the "real" world, people seem to think that Cobb kills her in the limbo scene which I didn't see.

Sorry you disliked it so much.

Re: Which woman does he kill off?

[lachesis.livejournal.com]

We were kind of of that mindset as well - Marion Cotilliard's acting was flat (possibly on purpose, but still) and we didn't care about her; the suicide scene was set up weird, and separately, the final act with the snow fort was "too big" in comparison with the rest of the film. Plus, the forger randomly pulling a bigger gun ("You have to dream bigger darling") kills the theory that the architect is either needed, or instrumental. Trying to be brief, but, yeah, glad to see other people are pulling on the threads as well.

Re: Which woman does he kill off?

[harlequinaide.livejournal.com]

Yeah, my thinking was that Cobb killed Mal twice. Once with her mind, and once in his mind. So much emo!

Here's the trip, for me: I think he was lying about her being insane and "fooling the doctors." I think that he just killed her, and the entire "she killed herself," was another lie. Because Cobb lies. It's what he does. I didn't see any evidence in the movie to convince me that he was trustworthy, and, as we know, "memories" can be faked (especially if he has convinced himself deeply enough that he didn't actually kill her).

[mzrowan.livejournal.com]

Or another theory: Mal was right, and he's been dreaming all along. The entire movie is a dream, from beginning to end.

I suppose that's possible

[drwex]

But what evidence is there for that? And if so, what's the point?

Re: I suppose that's possible

[mzrowan.livejournal.com]

The thing that struck me the most: why was Mal on the ledge opposite their hotel room? How did she get over there? To me, that made it stick out as a dream. I read another post about it that pointed out the walls of the alley in India shrinking in on him, which is also very dream-like.

The point, as elucidated in the post I just mentioned, is to draw a parallel between movies and dreams. Yes, it was entirely a dream from beginning to end -- and it doesn't matter. The emotions we and the characters experience are just as real, even if the setting is entirely "fake".

Re: I suppose that's possible

[mzrowan.livejournal.com]

Here's the article I was talking about: http://chud.com/articles/articles/24477/1/NEVER-WAKE-UP-THE-MEANING-AND-SECRET-OF-INCEPTION/Page1.html

Re: I suppose that's possible

[drwex]

Thank you for the link. I don't buy his theory, but it's an interesting analysis.

Re: I suppose that's possible

[drwex]

I agree that the Mal-on-the-ledge bit is bizarre, but I allow it on two primary grounds:

Filmically, it's a better scene if the two characters are facing each other.

Plot-wise, the entire evening is a set-up. She's told him where to go, and deliberately trashed the room to make it look like a struggle happened there. That fact doesn't constrain her at all - she's free to rent another room opposite, in order to put him in a position where they can talk but it's impossible for him to grab her and stop her from jumping.

[keren-s.livejournal.com]

I went with the "entire movie is a dream" theory. The whole spinning-top-while-dreaming thing was the idea he planted in Mal's head, but there is no reason that he can't believe he is awake (and therefore having the top fall) while still asleep. I think the flashback was accurate and Mal "killed" herself and woke up (how did she get on a ledge across from the room's window? I took that as being part of the dream), and everything we see is Cobb trying to redeem himself for what he feels is his guilt. When redeemed her allows himself to see his children, who do not seem to have aged at all from his memories (consistent with less and less time passing the higher level dream you're in), forgetting the top entirely. I'd like to think that when he finds the top still spinning he realizes Mal was correct, "kills" himself and wakes up for real.

See my reply to rowan

[drwex]

to the ledge bit.

I'm fine with "I'd like to think..." theorizing but I want to find evidence in the movie for my theories.

[keren-s.livejournal.com]

Also, during all the lower levels of dream, whoever is supposed to be the dreamer, Cobb brings in Mal, the kids, the train, etc. That suggests that he is always the dreamer.

Maybe

[drwex]

But the movie contends that this is Cobb's subconscious leaking in, due to his repressed issues with Mal. His conversations with Ariadne lay this out pretty explicitly.

The core problem with the "whole movie is a dream" theory is that you need some marker that the narrator is unreliable. Possibly the best recent movie of this ilk is "The Usual Suspects" which lays out in the last few minutes the markers you need, as a viewer, to accept that the narrator is unreliable. Inception lacks those markers.

[vibrantabyss.livejournal.com]

-0. Eh, I found the top wobble and cut out to imply ambiguity. My rant is with the fact that his kids are THE SAME AGE as in his memories, and he has been running, I believe, for years. For that alone, I condemn the picture, even though I found the rest of it perfectly put together.

0. As the Mol-memory(?) pointed out, the entire existence we have been shown is likely a dream - global scale persecution, etc. As with other "what is reality" movies (Jacob's Ladder, Total Recall, and others) I found So it is possible that at no point in the film have we seen waking life. And yes, I mean that right down to Mol committing suicide.

0. Totems were used to tell you if you were in someone else's dream - but say nothing about having your subconscious hijack your conscious dreaming...

1. I'm not sure he was willing to *let* himself accept the illusion - at any point in the past, I think the Mol-memory would have come in and disrupted his conscious attempts to create (or surrender) to a utopia - she certainly manifested elsewhere, and was damnwell trying to convince him the the deepest level was the most real, so why would she, a fragment of his subconscious, let him settle into something like that. Of course, that leave's the entire team fragments of his own mind...

2. My understanding of the dream-tech is that if you consciously drop a level, by sleeping within a dream to a deeper dream, then you have a much easier out - the kick, etc. So while Saito needs to be shot for release, RF can extract himself during (and using the mechanic of) the kick - which will still be occurring on all levels due to the time dilation.

3. So other than my -0 problem, I found it a wonderfully cohesive and ambiguous ending.

I should probably go off and see what other theories people have cooked up, but I want to stay away from that until I have had a second viewing. This will mean I stay away from the other comments here for now too...

the children

[drwex]

What I've read points to the fact that they seem to be wearing the same clothing as in his memory as evidence that they're not real. However, the age thing I'm not sure about. If he had really been gone for years then the kids would be responding to their mother's death and his absence differently. I get the feeling it's more on the order of several months.

(FYI, his wife's name is given as "Mal" which I found disconcerting.)

[stevie-stever.livejournal.com]

Actually, the ending works perfectly. Want to know why?

Five words: That is not his totem. In fact, in his hands, the top was never a totem at all. Remember where he explained he found it? That totem is(or was) his wife's. Really, it's why he warns about SIMPLE totems: His WIFE is his totem. Kids + Wife=dream. Kids standing alone=reality.

Which leads to the question, what does the top symbolize to him? Well, according to the hints from the story line, it's the root of all the guilt of which he refuses to let go. In the last scene, to bastardize Freud, it's just a top. A top waiting to fall over. The decision to fade to black before it falls over is just to tempt the viewer to figure out why.

Eh mebbe

[drwex]

The movie makes a significant shtick of the idea that a totem is a physical object with some observable, repeatable property. I'd need some justification for the idea that his totem would be something else.

Re: Eh mebbe

[stevie-stever.livejournal.com]

The warning to the architect on why
1) You need to pick your own totem
2) Your own totem must be simple