Based on the flood of "____ception" memes that hit the 'net after this film came out, I expected… more.
As the cardinal rule of filmmaking says: "Show, don't tell." Inception does an awful lot of telling. It (or its characters) never shuts up.
I will grant this: The visuals are incredible. From Ariadne's first ventures into the role of architect (the street-bending is aces) all the way down to Limbo. It's really too bad the writing wasn't equally nuanced.
Admittedly, Inception doesn't have the worst info-dumps ever. I just watched an episode of The X-Files, "The Erlenmeyer Flask", that had a scientist piling basic DNA science onto Agent Scully (a medical doctor) for the benefit of viewers who hadn't gotten to the DNA chapter of biology class yet. Now that was bad. Inception isn't quite that blatant about its info-dumps, but they do exist.
Putting off writing this review by a few hours really let me get tired, so I'm not inclined to write as much. But, it's also taught me that the plot isn't particularly memorable. The basic idea is simple, and things play out pretty much exactly as expected (broadly speaking). The details aren't that interesting, and the only plot point that surprised me (Dom actually being "responsible" for Mal's suicide) wasn't worth the overly long build-up.
Oh, did I mention this movie is two and a half hours long? It's too much. (About 7 minutes of the 148 are devoted to credits, and can be skipped if you wish, but that's still a long film.) I checked the clock several times wondering just how much longer this ordeal would last. Fortunately the falling van gave me a decent point of reference, so I didn't have to check as often.
Mostly, I'm disappointed at the lack of substance. I expected some real profound shit, based on the hype. I didn't get it. Some people say you need to watch this film several times to get everything that's going on, but I don't think so. This is a one-and-done movie with some pretty action scenes and inconsistent treatment of its own mechanics. (Seriously, why do the gravitational effects from the van swerving around only penetrate one dream level?)
Review by dgwVIP 10BlockedParent2018-11-22T08:13:12Z
Based on the flood of "____ception" memes that hit the 'net after this film came out, I expected… more.
As the cardinal rule of filmmaking says: "Show, don't tell." Inception does an awful lot of telling. It (or its characters) never shuts up.
I will grant this: The visuals are incredible. From Ariadne's first ventures into the role of architect (the street-bending is aces) all the way down to Limbo. It's really too bad the writing wasn't equally nuanced.
Admittedly, Inception doesn't have the worst info-dumps ever. I just watched an episode of The X-Files, "The Erlenmeyer Flask", that had a scientist piling basic DNA science onto Agent Scully (a medical doctor) for the benefit of viewers who hadn't gotten to the DNA chapter of biology class yet. Now that was bad. Inception isn't quite that blatant about its info-dumps, but they do exist.
Putting off writing this review by a few hours really let me get tired, so I'm not inclined to write as much. But, it's also taught me that the plot isn't particularly memorable. The basic idea is simple, and things play out pretty much exactly as expected (broadly speaking). The details aren't that interesting, and the only plot point that surprised me (Dom actually being "responsible" for Mal's suicide) wasn't worth the overly long build-up.
Oh, did I mention this movie is two and a half hours long? It's too much. (About 7 minutes of the 148 are devoted to credits, and can be skipped if you wish, but that's still a long film.) I checked the clock several times wondering just how much longer this ordeal would last. Fortunately the falling van gave me a decent point of reference, so I didn't have to check as often.
Mostly, I'm disappointed at the lack of substance. I expected some real profound shit, based on the hype. I didn't get it. Some people say you need to watch this film several times to get everything that's going on, but I don't think so. This is a one-and-done movie with some pretty action scenes and inconsistent treatment of its own mechanics. (Seriously, why do the gravitational effects from the van swerving around only penetrate one dream level?)