Film review
Directed by Christopher Nolan
Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page, Tom Hardy, Ken Watanabe, Dileep Rao, Cillian Murphy, Marion Cotillard
Release date 16 July 2010 (UK & US)

Cobb (DiCaprio) works in the field of ‘extraction’ – breaking into people’s dreams and stealing their secrets. Along with his accomplices Arthur (Gordon-Levitt), Eames (Hardy) and Ariadne (Page), he’s hired to carry out a job that some believe is impossible – to break into a dream and infect it with an idea…

It’s rare that a summer blockbuster possesses much ambition beyond smashing things up really, really loudly. The last film to do something radically different with the standard shock-and-awe ingredients was Christopher Nolan’s bleak and brilliant spin on the superhero flick, The Dark Knight. Now Nolan has returned with a new film that is part heist thriller, part SF epic, part art picture. This kind of mainstream yet personal filmmaking has rarely been seen since the 1970s.

As the story cuts between between countries and characters, and between waking and dream states, it takes a while to figure out who everyone is and what exactly is going on. But suddenly everything comes together, and the narrative hurtles forwards in a complex yet coherent manner. In contrast to something like Richard Kelly’s Southland Tales, Nolan’s convoluted SF story – which sees characters simultaneously embroiled in outlandish situations – is easy enough to follow, however mental it gets. For at its heart, Inception is a spin on the humble heist movie. If the Ocean’s 11 team had the power to distort the architecture of dreams, it might have played out like this…

In terms of spectacle, Inception also delivers, and the effects are all the more impressive for actually furthering the story. Cityscapes bend and cube in on themselves; a character floats through shifting hotel corridors trying to evade capture; a car chase is interrupted by the unexpected appearance of a freight train… Forget Avatar: these are sights we’ve never seen the like of before.


Populating the story are an army of big name actors. In addition to the impressive cast list at the beginning of this review, the likes of Pete Postlethwaite, Tom Berenger (who’s been languishing in direct-to-DVD hell for years), Michael Caine and Lukas Haas all pop up at various points, and they all add to rather than overwhelm the drama.

As Cobb’s sometimes reluctant accomplices, Gordon-Levitt, Paige, Rao and Hardy are terrific, making their characters feel fully fleshed-out despite rather limited back-stories. But this is DiCaprio’s movie. The last few years has seen the actor’s babyfaced features take on a sunken, craggy quality – a sort of damaged beauty that seemed appropriate in Revolutionary Road and Shutter Island, and is equally fitting here. DiCaprio’s intense, brooding turn as the emotionally traumatised dream thief perfectly captures the character’s slowly unravelling guilt and pain, as Cobb’s repressed emotions towards his late wife (an effectively ambiguous turn from Cotillard) risks jeopardising the entire mission.

For all its themes of repressed trauma and the true nature of reality, it’s important to stress just how much fun Inception is. It may be a big, serious SF movie, but Nolan still finds time to throw in a loving homage to the snow-bound chase from The Spy Who Loved Me and include a hugely exciting Heat-style gunfight. It’s one of those movies you just know is destined to be viewed again and again. And again. Matt McAllister

VERDICT: 10/10
Incredible. With an intricately woven narrative, brilliant effects and interesting characters, this is another classic for Christopher Nolan – and arguably his best work yet.