To get an idea of the complexity of the film, check out this infographic by Sean Mort, which is a stab at outlining the dream levels of the film:

I might quibble with the top level being called “reality” instead of perhaps another layer of Cobb’s dream, and I might watch the film again and realize I am completely wrong.  Having seen it only once, I am unclear about whether Cobb is dreaming in the outermost level, but here’s the thing: I don’t care.¹  Either he is dreaming or he’s not, but I expected that to be in question, and, frankly, would have been mildly disappointed if it were not.

Some have pointed out the film’s similarity to a video game, and some have posited a generational divide in understanding or liking the film (Henry Jenkins is in the middle of this debate, as outlined in this post), but I can’t help thinking about Inception as a film about film making and spectatorship.  This may not seem particularly insightful as first blush.  Apparatus theory is well known for treating film as a dreamspace, and the dream metaphor abounds in theory and in casual descriptions of the medium, so it makes some sense that a film about dreams might also be about film itself.  I would make the same argument about Waking Life, for example. Indeed, Nolan himself confirms both the video game parallel and dream-as-filmmaking motifs in a recent Film Comment interview.

The reason I don’t really care about the outermost shell of the film is that, even if there is an exterior reality for the characters (for Cobb, in particular), what does that mean for us, the viewers?  The whole thing is a construct; as the dreamspaces are constructed by Ariadne, the film’s premise, mise en scène, etc., is constructed by Nolan and everyone else who worked on the film, so the question is not about the lines between reality and the “subconscious,”² of the characters, but between the film world and that of the spectator.  In what respects do we, as spectators, inhabit the dreams of films, and to what extent does the cinema inform our imagination?  Where is the line between what we want to think of as reality and the barrage of media images we sustain daily?

So, in addition to being a film about filmmaking (and video games, and dreams…), the film is asking some fundamental questions about what we do when we go to the movies, and to what extent this activity is embedded in the ways in which we imagine and experience every other aspect of our hypermediated lives.  It is safe to say, at this point, that there is precious little distance between images, narratives, and ideas produced by others, mediated and shown to us on screens, and the lived, personal reality to which we believe we have privileged access.  These screened images have become an inextricable part of that reality, to the extent that it makes little sense to distinguish between the two.  Like others before it, the confusing, layered narrative of Inception brings this false dichotomy to the foreground.

1. which is not to say I won’t see it again and try to figure out more precisely what is going on. It is just not that important to understanding the narrative devices.
2. an unfortunate term I wish would disappear from pop culture in favor of “unconscious”

The observation is not about the movie, but the audience. Both times I saw this movie, first at about 1pm on weekday and next on Sunday night at 8pm, there were small children present. This film is extremely violent and has some explicit sexual imagery. Now, I’m not telling anybody how to raise their children, but last night I was watching the small girl, maybe 7 years old, down the row. During the sex scene, her mom was covering her eyes, but not during the violent scenes, like when Rorschach repeatedly drives a butcher knife into someone’s head. What message does this send about sex and violence? Violence = no problem, but sex, the thing that 99% of the world’s population will engage in and what many consider to be a natural, beautiful thing? Unfit for small children. I do realize that I sound like someone with no kids, and maybe I’m missing something, but that’s my unsolicited two cents.

The cinematography, however, is superb in places, which at times seems completely out of place.It is as if the cinematographer was on set with these horrible actors working with a hopelessly convoluted screenplay, and decided maybe to try to make something beautiful out of it. Artistry from boredom, perhaps?

One particular shot strikes me as incredibly well done and so out of place that it comes off as pretentious. I’ve been trying to figure out why, and I think it has to do with its placement in the film. The shot comes near the end of an already-too-long movie,  when the soldiers reach the beach and there’s a mass of confusion about who belongs where, and how they will get home. It is a continuous shot, I don’t know how long, that is elaborately choreographed, and includes a ferris wheel, injured soldiers, camerawork moving from character to character, complicated dialogue. I get what it’s doing: it’s showing the confusion, disillusionment and surrealism that accompanies war. But it stands out almost too much, and it takes place after much crosscutting back to the hospital in England and after the story has become so convoluted that the shot seems to be a comment on the film itself.

It was while rewatching Children of Men that I figured out why that shot didn’t work. CoM also has a very long tracking shot during a battle, with much the same effect, but it works. Why? Because the film sets you up for it with handheld camera work, long takes, and fairly dismal mise-en-scene from the beginning. That tracking shot is a culmination of all that came before, both stylistically and narratively, whereas with Atonement it stands out, becomes obvious in a film that relies on trickery and tired narrative and cinematic techniques to pull at heartstrings in the widest possible way.