The Case for the Blue Pill

Odd to see a movie that I am sure I have seen before, but know that I have not.

I mean, Inception's basic ideas seem very similar to the Matrix. It's not trying so hard to go for the bondage/trenchcoat chic of that ultimately disappointing franchise. There are no Messianic complexes (well, not really).

And the cast is decidedly A list with Leonardo DiCaprio's furrowed brow and Joseph Gordon Lovett's cool detachment instead of some Australians and Keanu Reeves. Inception also has good old Juno herself, Ellen Page, and even Master Michael Caine, but I have to say that Marion Cotillard again wipes the floor with everyone else. She is mesmerising in every scene she's in, stunningly beautiful in a way that continues to defy the image of the dowdy sparrow she played to win the Oscar for La Vie en Rose.

But, like the Matrix, Inception is all about the perception of reality, and the power to manipulate the reality of others through their dreams. DiCaprio plays an expert in this mental field, though it appears, Matrix-like, that everyone involved in the business comes equipped with built in dream martial arts skills and expert weapons training. And, also like the Matrix, sometimes the rules can be broken, and there are perils about getting in too deep...

Sorry, it is probably unfair to compare it so much to the Matrix, as this film is, despite very similar kind of origins, very different. There are no creepy computers out to get us all, just greedy corporations trying to get ahead of the game and destroy the competition. And it is on one of these jaunts - well, a very extreme kind of jaunt requiring boldness and innovation and a movie to tell it - that our heroes get themselves into all sorts of fun as things go not quite according to plan. Of course.

The plans through are the thing, as the visual landscape (if Marion Cotillard is not on screen to distract you from it) is breathtaking. The attention to detail in the perception and reality-defying special effects is incredible, and unlike some films where the CGI is painful in its obviousness (yes, I am still looking back to Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and shaking my head), it all looks real in a completely unreal way.

I also think I must be losing my hearing, or else the Embassy's wonderful bass speakers were impacting negatively on my auditory perceptions, as I found it incredibly hard to understand a lot of what was said. The soundtrack was engrossing and overwhelming, probably to try and keep up with the stunning visuals, but I found it sometimes detrimental to the experience when it drowned out the dialogue. No one else seemed so afflicted though, so perhaps it is just another sign of my developing deafness.

But, even if the sound system let me down (be it the Embassy's or my own), the giant Embassy screen was the perfect canvas upon which to display the film. Did I mention the visuals previously? Let me do so again: superb.

As for the story... well, the very final moments [possible spoiler alert] left almost the entire cinema groaning in its ambiguity. Everyone on the film seems utterly convinced by the plausibility of what they are saying - one of the benefits of having such sterling actors on screen - but really a lot of it just seems utter tosh: if gravity in one reality affects another parallel one, why does it not affect a third in the same way? I want to say more, ask morequestions about the logic, but I really can't without giving some of the revelations away, so I won't. Perhaps we can just debate this in a face to face encounter.

At any rate, despite - or possibly because - of the rave reviews, I was not as enamoured with Inception as I had thought I might be, and definitely did not experience the reported 9.2 out of 10 on the IMDB.com taste scale. It was brilliantly executed and realised, but, despite the splendour, there was still a sense of the "seen that" variety, which stopped the film from being, for me at least, quite the revelation, quite the rapture, that others seem to have experienced.

Verdict: An incredible feast to taste on a big screen, Inception's 2.5 hour running time fairly flies by as spectacle upon spectacle is thrust in front of the viewer's face. But the reality is that the film was not quite the dream that others
would have me believe, though perhaps if Marion Cotillard had been the heroine of the show, I would have been so entranced I wouldn't really have noticed. 8 totems out of 10.