Inception: Difference between revisions

[[File:inception_42381.jpg|frame|'''''[http://inception.davepedu.com BWOOOOOOOOOOONNNNNGGGG]''''']]

 

 

 

Dom Cobb ([[Leonardo DiCaprio]]) works as a freelance "extractor": using a briefcase-full of [[Applied Phlebotinum]] and several allies to help him, Cobb enters his targets' dreams and steals valuable information. Cobb's extraction skills make him a great thief, but they've also made him a fugitive, leaving him unable to return home to his family. When an attempt to extract information from a Japanese businessman named Saito ([[Ken Watanabe]]) goes wrong, Cobb goes on the run from his current employers.

Dom accepts Saito's proposal, even though it has one small catch: nobody has ever pulled off a successful inception.

 

 

[http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/65760 Nolan wants to make a game set in the movie's universe] ([[a Worldwide Punomenon|Obviously, the game will have four levels]]).

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== A-G ==

* [[Action Prologue]]

** The dream layers are also tinted differently to help the viewer discern between the switching scenes. The top dream layer is blue, the second is brown and the final dream level is white.

* [[Come with Me If You Want to Live]]: Saito does this to Dom. In a subversion, Dom (as Mr. Charles) does it to Fischer, albeit it's "if you want your secrets kept safe."

* [[The Constant]]: Played straight with the "totems." Inverted with everything else in the world around them. Furthermore, if you believe the entire film was a dream {{spoiler|the totems have no meaning, and everything is non-constant}}.

* [[Conveniently-Timed Attack From Behind]]: When Mal tries to attack Cobb with a knife in the last level, {{spoiler|Ariadne shoots her from behind him}}.

'''Cobb:''' I have it under control.

'''Arthur:''' I'd hate to see out of control.}}

{{quote|'''Ariadne:''' Mind asking your subconscious to take it easy?

'''Cobb:''' I can't, it's my subconscious.}}

{{quote|I hate trains.}}

* [[Genre Busting]]: [[Film Noir]] meets [[The Caper]] with a dose of [[Post Cyber Punk]].

* [[Love Makes You Crazy]]: {{spoiler|Mal. After she died, Cobb inherited a dose of crazy}}.

* [[Love Makes You Evil]]: Played with interestingly. {{spoiler|Cobb's love for Mal prompted him to [[Mind Rape]] her in order to get her out of Limbo. In turn, the brainwashed Mal ruined Cobb's life to make sure he would commit suicide with her. Cobb then knowingly risked the lives of his crew by trying to keep Mal alive in his dreams, whereupon she constantly sabotaged his jobs and attempted to kill his comrades so that he would join her in Limbo}}. You follow all that?

* [[Magic A Is Magic A]]: While the protagonists can alter dreams however they wish, in order to successfully steal or plant information they have to keep attention away from themselves long enough to do so. That means limiting in-dream special effects to subtle paradox trickery and convenient firearms, a la ''[[Mage: The Ascension]]''/''[[Mage: The Awakening]]''.

* [[Magic Is a Monster Magnet]]: Changing dreams too much causes this.

* [[More Dakka]]: After Arthur's [[Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy|firing proves ineffective]], Eames pulls out a grenade launcher to deal with the mooks.

{{quote|'''Eames:''' You mustn't be afraid to dream a little bigger, darling.}}

* [[More Than Mind Control]]: In order for inception to work, it's necessary to manipulate the subject into finding the idea that is to be implanted emotionally appealing on a subconscious level - otherwise the mind will reject it.

* [[Mortal Wound Reveal]]: After the shootout/car chase in the first level, it's revealed that the only character who didn't escape unscathed was {{spoiler|Saito}}.

* [[Rule of Symbolism]]: [[Theory of Narrative Causality|with in-universe justification]], no less - that's how dreams work. For example, why is Fischer Sr. lying on a hospital bed inside a ''bank vault'' inside an ''Arctic fortress''? Because he has a big secret, of course. Indeed, for a typical extraction, the architect will place a vault in the environment. The dreamer's subconscious will instinctively hide all important/secret information there. Then you just need a good team to extract it. Think of the other things can be added to the environment to aid or hinder a heist and it's easy to see why Nolan thinks the movie has potential as a game.

* [[Sacrificial Lamb]]: Nash, Cobb's previous architect.

* [[Scenery Gorn]]: Paris exploding near the beginning and the dream city collapsing into the sea near the end.

* [[Scenery Porn]]: Near on everywhere. Tokyo, Paris, the snow fortress, the final dream city...

* [[Sir Not-Appearing-In-This-Trailer]]: Yusuf, despite being a key player in the dreamscape, doesn't appear much in the promotional material, certainly not as much as the big stars. Mal isn't in much of the trailers either, though she does make it to the posters. In fact, on the main theatrical release poster that shows the entire team, Yusuf is pictured despite the fact his actor isn't among the [[All-Star Cast|sizable billing list of actors]]; even Pete Postlethwaite and Tom Berenger receive a mention in the billing despite appearing just a few minutes apiece in the film, but poor Dileep Rao is left out...

** On a positive note, his is one of only three actors names to appear on the Netflix envelope for the movie.

* [[Smart People Play Chess]]: There are several [[Chess Motif|chess references]] in the film, including Ariadne's totem (which is a bishop), the black-and-white tiled floor of the fortress, and the character name Robert Fischer, after Bobby Fischer.

* [[The Smurfette Principle]]: The crew consists of around six guys and one girl. There is one other important female character, and {{spoiler|for most of the film, she's a projection of the main (male) character's subconscious}}.

* [[Stealth Pun]]: They spend much of the movie talk about "training your subconscious" ...and then they bring in an actual train.

* [[Storming the Castle]]: The fortress assault.

 

== T-Z ==

* [[Thanatos Gambit]]: Mal {{spoiler|commits suicide, but makes it look like Cobb murdered her so he'll be compelled to do it with her or lose custody of the children. Of course, like the many characters who kill themselves in dreams in this movie, she doesn't believe she's really dying}}.

* [[Theory of Narrative Causality]]: Dreams.

* [[Through the Eyes of Madness]]: Depending on your interpretation of the film.

* [[Throw the Dog a Bone]]: Meta-example with one of the movie's costume designers and ''Michael Caine himself'' going on record to state that {{spoiler|the top falls over at the end}}.

* [[Zerg Rush]]: Non-militarized projections are limited to this, forming enormous crowds of hostile people who overwhelm intruders through sheer numbers. Militarized projections are more controlled, better-armed, and come in fewer numbers, but no less suicidally relentless.

* [[Zig-Zagging Trope]]: As noted above, the film initially subverts the typical "[[Your Mind Makes It Real|if you die in a dream, you die in reality]]" idea, but then plays it straighter later on, as {{spoiler|if you are very deeply sedated, dying in the dream means you end up losing your mind in real life due to being [[And I Must Scream|trapped]] in a [[Lotus Eater Machine]] for what might seem like eternity, and then subverts it again as it is possible to escape from said [[Lotus Eater Machine]] very easily if you know how, and if you're willing to, which is, of course, much harder when you don't even know that you're in the dream world, or just plain refuse to leave}}.

 

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