"Inception"

[00:00:00] You are listening to the Next Best Picture Podcast and this is a review of Inception.

[00:00:06] There's one thing you should know about me. I specialize in a very specific type of security.

[00:00:13] Subconscious security.

[00:00:16] You're talking about dreams.

[00:00:25] Mr. Carl has a job offer he would like to discuss with you.

[00:00:28] You got a work placement?

[00:00:35] Not exactly. We create the world of the dream.

[00:00:42] We bring the subject into that dream and they fill it with their secrets.

[00:00:48] Then you break it and steal it.

[00:00:50] Well, it's not strictly speaking legal.

[00:00:53] It's called Inception.

[00:01:02] Alrighty, already everybody you were just listening to the trailer for Inception and the story is as

[00:01:08] follows. Dom Cobb is a thief with the rare ability to enter people's dreams and steal their

[00:01:14] secrets from their subconscious. His skills have made him a hot commodity in the world of corporate

[00:01:21] espionage, but has also cost him everything he loves. Cobb gets a chance at redemption when he

[00:01:27] is offered a seemingly impossible task. Plant an idea in someone's mind. If he succeeds it will be

[00:01:36] the perfect crime, but a dangerous enemy anticipates Cobb's every move. The film is

[00:01:42] starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Ken Wantanabi, Joseph Goren Levitt, Marion Cotilliard,

[00:01:49] Elliot Page, Tom Hardy, Killian Murphy, Tom Beringer, and Michael Cain. It is written and directed

[00:01:58] by Christopher Nolan and here to join me today for this first 2010 Throwback Patreon podcast

[00:02:06] review I have Lauren La Magna. Hello. Josh Parm. Hello, hello. Danilo Castro. What's up everybody?

[00:02:15] Nadia Dalamonte. Hello everyone. And Dan Baer. You must be afraid to dream a little bigger darling.

[00:02:30] No, in all seriousness man this is really cool. You know I hadn't seen this in a long long time.

[00:02:36] Nolan works pretty frequently where he comes out with new film once every

[00:02:40] what maximum four years? Every two, three years or so? I mean so since Inception has come out

[00:02:48] we've gotten Dark Knight Rises from him. We've gotten Interstellar. We've gotten Dunkirk. We've

[00:02:54] gotten Tenet. We've gotten Oppenheimer. And so there's been a lot of time to re-watch those

[00:03:00] movies go back and re-watch The Prestige, The Dark Knight, Memento. Inception is a movie that

[00:03:05] I watched a lot when it came out in 2010 and it's a film that I haven't actually

[00:03:13] revisited in a very, very long time since its release here which made it feel all the more

[00:03:19] new again. And I think it's been the perfect way to kick start this retrospective here considering

[00:03:24] Christopher Nolan just came off of the professional artistic high of his career with

[00:03:30] Oppenheimer winning the Academy Award for Best Director, Best Picture. Made a ton of money, even

[00:03:37] more money than what Inception made if you can believe it. And this was a very interesting film

[00:03:43] for the time because it was following the success of The Dark Knight which you know really catapulted

[00:03:49] Nolan to a whole new level of stardom as far as filmmakers go and anticipation was

[00:03:56] really high Warner Brothers was leaning so heavily into the marketing for Inception telling

[00:04:00] everyone it was from the director of The Dark Knight and only two years after that film's release

[00:04:05] this one unloads itself onto the world with a brilliant unique idea and concept that people

[00:04:11] still to this day are wrapping their heads around and discussing theories and it has had I

[00:04:17] would say an enduring legacy. Here we are now 14 years removed from its release. Now is that

[00:04:25] because of Nolan's reputation is that because of the film itself a film that relies so heavily on

[00:04:32] exposition for a majority of its runtime. That's what I'm most curious to find out here is I'm

[00:04:37] curious to find out how it played for you all revisiting it now especially seeing Nolan's

[00:04:44] Grove as an artist over the years. So starting off first year as we dive levels deep into our

[00:04:51] subconsciousness to discuss this movie I'm going to start off first with Josh Parham. Josh what are

[00:04:57] your thoughts on Inception? So when I actually think about Inception first of all I remember

[00:05:05] just the time that it came out in and I would say that 2010 probably was the peak of my

[00:05:13] film bro era I think I could confidently say that. Whoa Josh Parham a film bro. I mean

[00:05:20] I did go to college at one point so yes I don't deny it and Christopher Nolan is a very

[00:05:28] important fixture in that culture and so I definitely remember being super excited for it. I was

[00:05:34] obviously a big fan of The Dark Knight and had so much anticipation for his next movie and

[00:05:39] at the time I remember thinking that it was really really great with some issues that I

[00:05:46] had with it but they were kind of minor in totality and I still thought it was just like

[00:05:50] an excellent film one of my favorites of the year but it is a movie that I have not really

[00:05:56] revisited a ton throughout the years. I've always like gone back to it here or there and

[00:06:00] actually in fact I think it was last year that one of my local theater showed it on 70

[00:06:04] millimeter in a theater so that was an incredible experience but it really isn't a movie I have

[00:06:09] felt a great urge to return to all that often and watching it again just recently I still think

[00:06:17] it's a really exceptional movie. I think that it is still a showcase of some of Nolan's best

[00:06:22] tendencies as a filmmaker. I think that he does put on spectacle in a really unique and interesting

[00:06:28] way and I do find myself being very compelled by just the concept of this movie and most of

[00:06:33] these characters even. I also think this movie is an example of some things that I don't really like

[00:06:40] from Nolan and I think something that he's actually evolved past I don't really see it

[00:06:45] so much now but I do think that when it comes to his portrayal of some of these action set pieces

[00:06:51] some of them are really really well done other times I do not like them at all I think particularly

[00:06:56] towards the end of this movie there are some really big set pieces that I don't think are

[00:07:02] well assembled and that is the side of Nolan that I kind of forgot about and I am not a really big

[00:07:07] fan of. I also take issue with some things in his screenplay being so dependent on that exposition

[00:07:13] so I would say it's a movie that has lessened a little bit since the time I first saw it but

[00:07:19] I still think the overall achievement is very very impressive and I still think that this

[00:07:24] can be counted as a great film one of Nolan's greats maybe not the the top tier that once

[00:07:31] was for me but I still really really do like this film. Alright okay let's hear next now from

[00:07:37] Lauren LaMagna. Lauren what do you think? So just like you Matt it's been a while since I've seen

[00:07:43] this film in its totality my earliest memory of it is probably like a commercial of that shot

[00:07:51] of Leonardo DiCaprio and Elliot Page sitting at that market where everything just explodes

[00:07:56] in slow motion and that really enticed me and I think this film is still a pretty good piece of

[00:08:04] science fiction. I think it's an incredible idea that really allows you know its audience to take

[00:08:10] what it wants and to dive deeper into different levels of you know what it means to be a person

[00:08:15] and to love and to have relationships with people and what we will do and how far we would go

[00:08:20] to get what we want which is all the wonderful reasons why you would explore a story within

[00:08:25] the genre and I think it's also a pretty good action piece and I love what it tells about you know grief

[00:08:32] and loss and all of that stuff. I enjoy the special effects the only reason why I personally think

[00:08:40] right now it may be a little outdated is because of how long it's been and that's just how far

[00:08:44] technology has come but I think for it being a 2010 piece it's pretty damn great.

[00:08:52] As far as my only negatives I would say the narration I think I agree it relies a lot on

[00:08:58] exposition but I think in the beginning Nolan explains its rules pretty well but as we get

[00:09:04] further into the film he loses part of the story in favor of you know showcasing what he can do

[00:09:11] as a filmmaker technically which is fine it's okay you can get away with it but

[00:09:17] the story does become much less because of all of those plot holes that are coming and all of those

[00:09:23] questions and ambiguity but at the end of the day it's still a really impressive piece of filmmaking

[00:09:29] I really enjoy it I think again it's very good sci-fi not my favorite Nolan but it's definitely

[00:09:33] you know one of the best and showcases how great he is in general as you know

[00:09:39] an action and science fiction filmmaker. All right okay moving along here on next to

[00:09:46] Danilo Castro. Danilo current thoughts on Inception? So the first time I saw it I think I was 15

[00:09:54] which is just like prime age to see this movie in a theater blew my mind especially on the

[00:10:00] heels of the dark night I was just ready and this movie delivered sort of everything I was wanting

[00:10:05] from a Nolan movie at that point and then some it's not one I guess to sort of jump on what everybody

[00:10:11] else is saying that I watch every every couple years per se it's probably been about five or six

[00:10:17] years since I've seen it so it was kind of nice to re-familiarize myself with the movie for this

[00:10:24] I think this movie still kicks ass. I don't have a lot of criticisms I have a couple that

[00:10:30] I'll probably you know get into especially once we start talking about the specifics of sort of

[00:10:35] the plot and the way it moves especially on the back end but this movie still really holds together

[00:10:41] for me that the the iconography of the film I think is still very strong I think it still has

[00:10:47] a punch to it. I think the ensemble is really fun especially now that we've sort of come to

[00:10:53] know a lot of these players as Nolan's sort of like repertory you know group of actors

[00:10:59] and I think you know we'll get more into the tendencies that Nolan has of exposition as

[00:11:08] characterization he's a big fan of doing that. I think that kind of just comes with the territory

[00:11:13] frankly it's something he's done less of and more of as his career has gone on he's sort of

[00:11:19] tinkered with that for me personally I think it works pretty well here and I think it's because

[00:11:24] he's created such an interesting world and he's created a sort of a premise in which he's able to

[00:11:30] do that but still hold our attention throughout so that's not a critique I have even though I

[00:11:34] acknowledge it is this is pretty exposition heavy film so um yeah on the whole yeah this movie

[00:11:41] still holds up very well for me. All right and up next I would like to hear from Dan Baer.

[00:11:51] So in 2010 this was the coolest movie on the face of the planet and I loved it I saw it

[00:12:02] twice in theaters because after you see it once then you have to take a friend

[00:12:07] because you got to tell them about it but if you're gonna tell them about it you might as

[00:12:12] well just take him to see it and I remember at the time there were sort of like two big

[00:12:19] talking points three big talking points about the movie one was that it was all exposition

[00:12:26] but no one could understand it anyway. Two that Tom Hardy was just the hottest man on the face of

[00:12:36] the planet which there's a reason why I chose that line for my intro line this this podcast review

[00:12:45] and the third was that a lot of people didn't like that it didn't really feel like actual dreams

[00:12:54] which at the time was my biggest problem with it was that like you know spend almost half the

[00:13:03] movie if not more of it in these dream worlds that don't really feel very dream-like they feel

[00:13:11] kind of like just like the regular world and I had issues with that I wanted it to be more

[00:13:19] creative I wanted it to be more surreal I wanted it to be all these things but on top of that

[00:13:25] I could realize that this was still an incredible action movie and seeing it twice really did

[00:13:34] a lot to help with the spots that I didn't really get the first time around because the dialogue just

[00:13:42] goes by so fast some points like little nuance is like whose dream we're actually in at any given

[00:13:48] point but in the times that I have watched Inception since seeing it in theaters it has

[00:13:57] not played as well on rewatch for me and I think that's because once you know the mechanics of how

[00:14:07] the story works and how the dream works I don't think this is very deep like there's not

[00:14:13] anything that I will come back to on subsequent watches and say oh my gosh I missed that

[00:14:19] or like this this little detail just changes everything about the movie no it's

[00:14:23] it's pretty much like once I find with this movie anyway that once you understand

[00:14:30] every plot beat and you know what's going on the movie is just what the movie is and what the

[00:14:37] movie is is it's still super entertaining no matter whether you understand it or not because

[00:14:44] everything is just moves so well but it's still for me one of the most thrilling action movies of

[00:14:54] the 2000s and it's kind of wild to me that there have been so many movies since that have tried

[00:15:04] their damnedest to imitate this from the score to the editing to even some you know crazy ideas

[00:15:12] in this setup often imitated never duplicated it's truly one of a kind and even though I have problems

[00:15:21] with it I still love it to all of our listeners of the next best picture podcast we know you love

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[00:16:38] so inception has held up pretty well for me after all these years i have pretty clear memories of

[00:16:44] being on a high from the dark night and going to see inception for the first time in theaters and

[00:16:52] more than anything else i was just amazed by the scale and the ambition and it's a movie that i've made

[00:17:01] more and more sensitive over the years but at the time of first watching it it was just purely

[00:17:07] exciting to behold no one's big ideas and vision and i knew that i was watching something really

[00:17:14] unique and special and i think in all of my rewatches since then the the thematic layers of

[00:17:25] the story have stood out a lot more for me i think it's one of the best depictions of guilt regret

[00:17:32] self-destruction and this major recurring theme of no one's work being time how do we use it and

[00:17:39] what if we could maximize it through our subconscious and until he made Oppenheimer this was no land

[00:17:45] as best for me where his ambition and his concepts fuse with mostly memorable characters that linger

[00:17:53] in your mind it's it's a true spectacle and it's also intimate it's familiar in the sense of

[00:18:03] its blockbuster kind of format and it's also unique and feels personal to Nolan i i think that he lays

[00:18:11] the groundwork of the story really well it's consistently transfixing from the concepts and

[00:18:18] the visuals to the iconic score and the design of the dream worlds and it features a really great

[00:18:28] ensemble cast who even though some characters depend heavily on exposition which is one of my

[00:18:36] critiques of the movie overall they really do a great job of towing that line between reality

[00:18:43] and projection namely Leonardo DiCaprio who anchors the stories the Matic residents and

[00:18:50] Kylian Murphy whose performance i think is so integral to the emotional ending of the

[00:18:56] movie so overall i'm a big fan of it i maybe even just as much as i was when i first saw it but for me

[00:19:06] it resonates a lot more on a thematic and emotional level after all these years it kind of started

[00:19:12] as this big collective theatrical experience and once i kind of got deeper into Nolan's

[00:19:22] dreamscape and how grounded it is the movie became a lot more uh memorable and resonating on a one on

[00:19:29] one level so i remember very very well watching this movie on opening night on july i believe it was

[00:19:45] like the middle of july if i remember correctly it's usually the middle of july with Nolan

[00:19:50] that's right yeah because i do remember in the trailers distinctly like july being highlighted

[00:19:57] and it was um you it was also the release date of the dark night so Warner Brothers was looking to

[00:20:02] capitalize on that same time frame for success again box office wise this was really a carte

[00:20:09] blanche movie for Nolan you know like following the success of that movie where it was like okay

[00:20:15] i made you all this money now give me a lot of money so i can go off and make something i want

[00:20:19] to make and i promise you it will all work out in the end and you will get your money back

[00:20:24] and i'm sure they all wrote that check thinking uh okay you know like but man oh man this was proof

[00:20:33] that i knew that this movie was going to work i saw it at thursday night opening night at

[00:20:39] midnight because back then there were no seven p.m. showings on thursday night no no no you

[00:20:45] went at midnight oh the days of of actual midnight shows yes yep i saw this i loved it i could not

[00:20:55] tell you what the hell was going on most of the time i found it incredibly hard to follow

[00:21:02] on my first viewing some of that was because um man even back then i was having issues with

[00:21:09] making out nolan dialogue and i just didn't realize it at times but i was so transfixed by this movie

[00:21:17] and i was into it on an emotional level like i could follow the story with regards to

[00:21:23] cobs journey and so what did i do i bought a ticket for the first showing friday morning

[00:21:30] whatever it was eight nine ten a.m i can't remember exactly but whatever the first

[00:21:34] showing of the day was i bought another ticket and i went straight to the theater and i watched it

[00:21:38] a second time just a few hours later i just couldn't get enough of that film man i saw that movie i

[00:21:45] think like five times when it first came out and by the time that whole year was done i really

[00:21:53] got my fill of it you know it comes out later on on uh dvd blu ray i watch it again and like

[00:22:00] i said in a year since then this is not one that i've been really keen to go back and revisit

[00:22:07] and that was the question that i wanted to answer for myself with this latest viewing was why

[00:22:13] is it the way that the story is structured and how it is told is it something else am i going

[00:22:19] to discover something new what is it about inception that for me still in my mind a good

[00:22:25] movie but maybe similar to dan where once i got my fill of it there's really not much else left to

[00:22:34] return to and so when i watched it again this time what i ended up walking away with was this i still

[00:22:41] think it is madly entertaining exceptionally well made all of the awards that it received

[00:22:49] during its run uh and the oscars have received all of them deserved we'll get into that a

[00:22:53] little bit later on but i did also find myself not so much engaging with the movie during those

[00:23:02] moments of exposition but i actually did find myself more so taking the ideas and concepts that

[00:23:08] no one was presenting and applying them to my own life and actually kind of deconstructing

[00:23:14] my own perception of dreams and wondering why at 34 years of age i rarely do dream anymore

[00:23:22] and when i do maybe i'm gonna now take this as an opportunity to maybe think about my dreams a

[00:23:30] little bit deeper the next time around because it doesn't really happen for me that often i

[00:23:35] swear to you i don't know what it is if it's the environment or what but i i don't dream

[00:23:41] nearly as much as i used to when i was younger um i don't know what that says about me but

[00:23:46] i do feel like there's a lot of very interesting ideas here and there's a level of exploration

[00:23:51] with regards to dreams and theory behind dreams and how they work and how they operate and what

[00:23:58] our minds do when we are asleep that i was more interested in that than i was literally anything

[00:24:04] else about the movie this time around so kind of going off of that though in terms of like

[00:24:11] where to start here i do think that when we think about inception and i don't want to speak for

[00:24:18] everybody but for me i think most about nolan presenting much along the lines of something

[00:24:26] like memento a twisty narrative with story structure and ideas and concepts that you've

[00:24:34] just never seen another filmmaker tackle before but the difference this time around

[00:24:40] is that unlike memento where it was a small independent film this was a large studio

[00:24:46] blockbuster with a budget of 160 million back in 2010 so when i think about it from that standpoint

[00:24:54] i can't really tell you the last time prior to inception that i can recall of a movie having

[00:25:02] this many heady concepts with this size of a budget and that's what's brilliant about

[00:25:07] nolan for the most part at least in terms of what i find is that he is somebody that can take

[00:25:13] very traditional blockbuster filmmaking but melded with these very

[00:25:20] high-minded concepts and i think at the core inception absolutely fulfills that and especially

[00:25:26] in 2010 that was not something that most audiences got to see and i am so appreciative of nolan being

[00:25:32] able to to bring that to people and kind of take that chance and i am very appreciative i

[00:25:39] do think though that the reason why he is able to do that is because he does leave

[00:25:45] so many pathways for a general audience to understand this story and i will admit that for

[00:25:52] me i think to the movie's detriment and even back in 2010 i remember people saying like oh this

[00:25:57] is such a hard movie to follow it's so complicated and even then i was like it's not really because

[00:26:04] there's multiple times when people just stop the plot dead in its tracks to just explain

[00:26:10] exactly what is happening and i actually think this story would have a little bit more impact if

[00:26:15] it trusted me a little bit more to find those answers on my own throughout the story and

[00:26:21] i think nolan actually does get that confidence as a storyteller later on in his filmography

[00:26:26] but this one i do think that as much as i appreciate the concepts and the ideas and

[00:26:32] and the emotional depth of these characters are going through i do think that just structure wise it

[00:26:38] i do have a lot of frustrations with how much this movie just wants to explain things to you when

[00:26:44] i think it would actually be so much stronger if it left some of that up as a mystery and just

[00:26:49] let me find it on my own it would certainly engender itself more to rewatch ability i think

[00:26:56] if like memento yeah yeah hey everyone start in the rough this is a preview of our review for

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[00:27:42] next time

[00:27:55] so

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