Inception

In the not-to-distant future we humans have developed the technology to enter into the subconscious, or dream state rather, of another of our fellow humans. Simply by being connected as a group to this device, all those connected enter into the subconscious of the host person together and enjoy (or sometimes decidedly not enjoy) a shared experience. Several engineering firms make this technology available and, in typical capitalistic fashion, it gets used both for good and for the not-so-good. An employee for one of the big engineering firms in question, Cobb, is the best of the best; however, it was recently suspected that he may killed his wife and, so, now he’s on the run and can only use his skills for the black market version of the legit technology. As with any black market version of legit goods and services, the clientele generally wants something stronger and wants to use it for more nefarious objectives.

Enter Saito, a wealthy Japanese business man who seeks to use the technology to plant a desire in a competitors head, a process called inception apparently, that would make said competitor want to break up his, far too successful for Saito’s liking, business. Saito wants the very best, so he hires Cobb and asks Cobb to assemble a team of all-stars. Think of it like a heist movie, but the movie takes place primarily in the mind of an unknowing participant. Generally, the dream world works like the real world in terms of physics; however, if the host is significantly jarred in one part of the dream it screws with the physics of another part of the dream and, obviously, one is limited by time, as people don’t tend to sleep forever. This means it’s a heist movie where the, say, bank is going to suddenly disappear if they don’t finish their work on time and the bank might suddenly be upside down or on it’s side if the host falls over or gets flipped in another part of the dream. All the while Cobb is battling the demons he’s carrying around from the death of his wife. All of this combined makes the job very tough and the movie very tense.

Christopher Nolan is on one hell of a run. His movies are engaging, original and always produced at rich, quality levels. His movies are unique, well written, well shot, well acted and even well scored. From Memento to Dark Knight to The Prestige, he hasn’t missed the mark in years. In my opinion, Inception may be at the top of his list. As usual, Nolan made a movie that you don’t even have to understand to enjoy and every moment from first to last is gripping. Literally on the ride home my wife is saying, I wanna watch that again.

WW