Inception

I don’t want to say I’ve seen it before, but…

After the first nested dream I was reminded of two films I’d seen, “The Lathe of Heaven” made by PBS (WNET) based on the Ursula K Le Guin novel, and “Lathe of Heaven” made by A&E (yes I did used to have Cable).

The other film that I went in with a prejudiced expectation of seeing was “Paprika” by Satoshi Kon, but that was not too heavily referenced, the dreams in Inception sticking closer to reality, like in “Abre los Ojos”, a flaw in Vanilla sky was allowing less subtle surrealism into the dreams at times, giving hints which deny the Spanish originals sharp twist at the end.

The recurring dead wife motif was definitely reminiscent of “Solyaris” (Tarkovsky, ’71), but Mal and Ariadne were both facets of “Annie Cartwright” from the UK version of “Life On Mars”.

So Jim Phelps takes the IMF on a dream diving escapade. Technobable, a couple of neat ideas and what have we got, licence to have an action flick where we can get away with zero G in a hotel and trains ploughing through a monsoon soaked LA. Oh American spell checkers always hate the UK spelling of plowing.

I did not think “12 Monkeys” at all, but now, rethinking through the airport scene I am wondering if that was a tribute to that film, or more especially “La Jetée” which 12 monkeys is derived from.

So were you please or disappointed that it had the exact same ending as Solyaris? I almost expected it to start raining in the house. There was another film where the hero escaped into a coma state, no not “One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest”, but I can’t place it for now.

Hans Zimmer soundtrack was pretty good. FX excellent. “photography” was lush, the Paris sequences especially.

Pete Postlethwait and Leo in a film together again. Ellen Page all (more) grown up.