DVDs and Films You Have Watched Recently #2

[Devon Malcolm]

Still on Inception, here's a review from someone on my friends list on Letterboxd. He's not happy. I don't agree with all The Matrix stuff because The Matrix is worse than Inception, but it's still some rant:-

 

The age-old question still begs for an answer: what does it mean for a movie to be "intelligent"? At first, I searched The Dark Knight, but there was nary a clue to be found. But I did not falter, I did not fear, for an even more promising hope lie ahead - Inception - a film championed for its smart approach to the sci-fi genre. My journey continues here.

 

Inception hooked me before I even saw the film. I'm a HUGE sucker for big sci-fi, so it's almost not even fair. I was predisposed to join the ranks of the easily-impressed, non-thinking masses and proclaim this the next Matrix. So...what went wrong?

 

The movie starts out well enough, but Nolan quickly upends his bag of tricks and spills out so much shit so early on, it becomes almost a challenge to keep up with who's dreaming, why they are dreaming, what is real, what is a dream, who any of these characters are, what they want, who they work for, what their goal is, etc. This is the mark of a writer *desperately* trying to convince the audience that he's brilliant. Bud...if you wanted to do that, just simply write a good story that flows logically and- fuck, I lost him already. Dropped the L-word. I should have known better.

 

The story then begins to unfold at such a languid, glacial pace, I had to keep checking my watch to make sure it wasn't ticking backward. It's a 2.5 hour-long film that feels more like 5.2 hours, and the reason for this is that a preponderance of the first act is amateurish, conflict-free exposition. Listen...if you want people to think your movie is "intelligent", don't decide on the most basic, straight-forward, beginner-level delivery method of getting information to the audience. Here, Nolan approaches dialogue as a first-time amateur would - someone asks a question simply because the audience has to know the answer, and someone gives us the answer. That's it. That's literally how we find out everything that is going on in the story. Nolan chooses the *least-intelligent* way! This friggen guy totally forgot the #1 rule of screenwriting - SHOW, DON'T TELL!

 

I clearly understand that sci-fi demands a lot more "explaining" than any other genre, so naturally, there's a lot for the audience to learn. However, that is not an acceptable excuse for approaching the material in the most dumbed-down way possible. If you're focus is making an intelligent film, that is the last thing you want to do. James Cameron made a brilliant move in The Terminator by giving us a big exposition dump during a car chase. So not only do we get to learn about the world and the character motivations and what's at stake and damn near everything we need to know in the story, but we're entertained by the action. It's not just two talking heads. Talking heads are boring. Stuff happening is fun. We like stuff happening. It's in our nature. We don't want to be lectured, we want to have fun. The key is hiding the lecture within the fun stuff - and THAT is a true hallmark of intelligent sci-fi screenwriting. What Nolan does is a shining example of what *not* to do.

 

The biggest offender is the character of Ariadne (a name with the subtlety of a jackhammer). Sure, we need at least one character to be the outsider - to be *us* - to know as little as we do so there's a reason for stuff to be explained. That's Sarah Conner. That's Luke Skywalker. That's Neo. We are them by proxy. They are also the heroes of their respective stories - Ariadne is not. She's just a pawn, a voice-box, thrown in for the sheer purpose of asking questions. This is a problem, because asking questions is literally all she does! Dom Cobb is the hero, but he already knows all this crap. He doesn't learn squat. He just kinda hangs around and explains shit in the most passive, conflict-free way possible. YAWN. Way to struggle, hero of the story. Move past all this so this dude has something to actually *do*.

 

Sarah and Luke and Neo have to learn because they are the ones who must change, become the hero, and defeat the villain. Their learning has a purpose that goes far beyond getting the audience to know shit. Ariadne's doesn't. All she does in this movie is ask questions. Seriously, read the script. There is a solid 30-40 page chunk where every single line of dialogue she has is a god damn question. I had to stop reading because it just got hilarious, like it was spoofing itself. How do you even spoof something that's already ridiculous? Sure, she designed the dream worlds, but A) they were boring, lifeless, and sucked, and B) designing the dreams is such a non-event, it's hardly worth bringing up. She could have done that totally off-screen and it would have worked just as well. Give her a reason to be there - a *physical* reason. Give her something to *do* other than follow Leo around and tell him he's crazy.

 

Just don't play the Inception Drinking Game and take a shot every time Ariadne asks a question, because even if you're drinking water, you'll still vomit in 10 minutes time.

 

This is not only a problem because it's boring, but it's a problem because it will be even more boring on repeat viewings - when you already know what the voice-box still doesn't. The market scene where the street is folded over is visually very cool, but offers nothing else to enjoy if you've already seen the scene. It's just two people standing around and talking. Bor-ing! Compare this to the scene where Neo learns about The Matrix...Neo learns the true fate of Earth (drama), learns that he needs to help or they are doomed to be forever ruled by machines (high-stakes), learns how the matrix works by "learning kung-fu" and fighting Morpheus (action), learns there are no limits by watching Morpheus make the huge jump (set-up for later action scenes that explore the absence of limits), learns that he must make the jump that nobody has ever made on their first attempt (suspense), etc. I can keep going. That's how strong and *intelligent* the writing is for The Matrix.

 

Inception takes the easy road and just has two people talk about how they can manipulate the dream world. Where is the drama? Where are the high stakes? Where is the action? Where is the set-up for later pay-offs, and where is the suspense? A truly intelligent film like The Matrix can stuff all of those things into one small sequence, but Inception fails to get even *one*. That's pathetic. All the Inception scene has is eye-candy (which can also be found in the Matrix sequence).

 

You can make an argument that when Ariadne starts changing things around and the projections start looking at her and bumping into her, that qualifies as suspense and set-up for the later scene where Cobb pretends to be Mr. Charlie - and I would agree with you. No, that is not a contradiction. The suspense is there (what's going to happen if she keeps changing stuff?) and the set-up is there, but what does it mean? What is the function of telling us that? The scene tells us that we need to know bad things will happen if you keep changing the dream world. Awesome. No, seriously. That's not a sarcastic 'awesome', but a real one. I could not wait for the heroes to be backed into a proverbial corner later in the story and *forced* to change the dream world in order to continue with the mission - doing the thing you don't want to do because it will mean more difficulty, but having no other option than to do that very thing, which means a lot of big, juicy conflict - the stuff every good story is made of. Promise, at last!

 

But...where the fuck are the scenes in the mission when they change anything?!!?!?! Cobb becoming Mr. Charlie is the only one - and the most that happens then is a bunch of extras turn and look at him. That's all. That's literally all. Christ, that scene was at least twice as short as the scene that explained why changing the dream world was bad! Holy fuck, are you kidding me?! You have to go pretty far out of your way to miss an opportunity like that.

 

There's also a bit of time devoted to explaining everything about the totems...how they work, why they work, why you need one...they even show Ariadne making hers. This is a bit of a trivial complaint, but it's a failure nonetheless...why tell us all this? At least half of that information, we didn't need to know because it doesn't come into play later on. They could have got by with only explaining the purpose of the totem instead of wasting valuable minutes during the most boring section of the film going into details that we literally have no reason to know. As minor as that complain may seem, it has far-reaching impact on the pacing of what was an already-slow film. If you're telling us all this about totems, do something more with them. There is never an instance in the film where a totem matters for any character except for Cobb.

 

The mission itself is fucking stupid. The whole idea has absolutely no personal ramifications for anyone. What do I care about one corporation one-upping another? Hell...what does Cobb care? Or Ariadne? Or Arthur? Or Eames? Or anyone other than Saito? Nobody gives two fucks, and if the heroes that I'm supposed to empathize with and live through vicariously don't care, why should I? It's just a paycheck for them, and a means to an end for Cobb - do mission, accomplish otherwise totally unrelated goal of getting home to see kids. The whole thing feels pasted-in and not an organic element of the story. An energy contract? That's the best you can do, Mr. I Spent 10 Years Writing This Story? Were those years ages 5 through 15, perhaps?

 

If this film was as smart as it wants you to believe it is, it would have amped up the internal conflict by making the mission itself actually mean something by having the accomplishment of the mission have some kind of consequence, whether it be with any one of the numerous cardboard, one-dimensional side characters in desperate need of some fleshing-out, or with Cobb himself. Imagine the meaty conflict that would arise if doing this mission would in some way harm Cobb's partner, his best friend, or even himself. Turn it into a Sophie's Choice type of thing and make it interesting. Make him have to sacrifice something in order to get what he wants so badly. Make it that much more difficult. That's what an intelligent story would have done. Inception is not that type of story, so it missed that opportunity, as well.

 

Not only are people wrong in saying that this is an intelligent film, but they are also wrong when they call it a 'heist film', as so many wanna-be intellectuals do. If it's a heist film, where's the threat of being caught? Just because you go somewhere to do something doesn't mean it's a heist. It's more of a siege film than anything because the threat of being caught while pulling the caper was replaced with faceless nobodies shooting guns - what we can only assume is the most intelligent and creative thing Nolan can come up with.

 

And while we're on the topic of faceless nobodies, how intelligent is it to provide *zero* character development for 99% of the cast? Pretty much everyone is stock. Cobb is interesting because he wants something and wants it badly. That's good. But what do we know about Arthur? Eames? Ariadne? Yusuf? Fischer? Browning? Miles? Nothing. We know nothing. These aren't characters, they are placeholders. They are the nametag at the table, but nobody is sitting down.

 

Flesh these assholes out, asshole! Look at how well-drawn everyone - EVERYONE - is in Star Wars. Look at all the adjectives you can use to descrive Han Solo: rogue, charming, dashing, arrogant, confident, scoundrel, sexy, anti-hero, etc. I can list about 15 more, but if you don't get the point by now, why bother. Even Chewbacca has more character than any team member in Inception.

 

Mal was somewhat interesting (subtlety needs to be written in all caps for that one!), but she is also a horrendously flawed aspect of this story. She's supposed to be the villain, I suppose? The fact that I even have to ask that question is ridiculous. She simply cannot function as a proper antagonist because she is never a threat to anyone except for Cobb. All the generic nobodies on the good team just shoot the faceless nobodies on the bad team. I've seen more depth in Call of Duty online deathmatches.

 

The idea of Mal threatening Cobb in the dreams is cool, but under-utilized and completely separated from the rest of the movie. It really has nothing to do, emotionally, with Cobb's goal of getting home to see his kids. It's not integrated at all. They are two separate conflicts that feel like they are from two separate stories. Tie that shit together, man! An intelligent screenwriter would have no problem doing just that, and not have to be told to do it.

 

That is a huge problem, because the more time Cobb spends with Mal, the less time he spends doing the actual mission, which is what he wants to do, and what he needs to do in order to see his kids again. Defeating Mal does nothing but get her out of the picture. It accomplishes nothing else. She's purely a surface nuisance. All the time Cobb spends putzing around with her is time that could have been spent on doing important mission stuff, but that is all handled by everyone else. Cobb almost didn't even have to be there in the dream. He didn't plant the idea - his team did. Again, none of this is integrated. In Jaws, Hooper and Quint don't hunt the shark while Brody stays behind to deal with his fear of water...it's tied together in one cohesive unit. Inception completely fails to do this in any way with any part of any aspect of this entire story. It's like Nolan threw a bunch or unrelated crap in a blender and forgot to hit Start. Inexcusably dumbed-down screenwriting.

 

This film also suffers from one of the same problems that plagued The Dark Knight: weak set-pieces. That seems strange, considering it's a concept about dream worlds, but...where's the cool shit? The zero-G hotel fight was cool and unique, but apart from that, the best we get is a few incredibly generic gunfights with incredibly generic characters just shooting each other, a van falling off a bridge for about 40 minutes real-time, and On Her Majesty's Secret Service?

 

THESE ARE DREAMS, MOTHERFUCKER! DO YOU KNOW WHAT A DREAM IS?!

 

These dream worlds are too ordinary, too mechanical, too cold. It should have been more personal and emotional the deeper you go, but there is no heart or emotion in this movie *at all*, and that kills a tremendous amount of the fun factor. You can have a movie with a radical concept dealing with dreams and make it fun without sacrificing the intellectualism that you're striving for. Total Recall did just that. And if you've seen that film, you know where Nolan stole the ending of this one from.

 

Both films - Total Recall and Inception, play all kinds of mind games - but Total Recall often really gets into questions of reality and whether we can ever know what reality is...something given a line or two of dialogue in Inception - dealing with the wife's inability to tell the difference - a *tell* exposition scene rather than the great *show* scenes like the sweating Rekall guy, who makes *us* wonder what is real. Inception is a movie that makes us think about these questions, but Recall puts us in the situation so that we feel the confusion ourselves, and have to think for ourselves. In this film, it's Mal who experiences it and Cobb tells another character about it, so we are being told instead of having the story allow us the experience. Again - exposition...the easy way out. Nothing more than "second-hand storytelling". Nothing an amateur couldn't have done.

 

Just because Total Recall is a fun ride and you *could* switch off your brain and watch it, doesn't mean that keeping your brain on is a waste of time. But for all the sci-fi cheese, Total Recall was a much more "real" film than Inception. It made me feel things instead of just letting me watch stuff happen. And feelings are critical to reality, as the Inception carpet scene tells us. If I had felt the carpet in this film the way I felt that the sweating Rekall guy was just trying to bullshit me, I might have been a little easier on this film.

 

The cast is strong, but if you're they are not given any character (which they are not) or anything interesting to do (which they are not), what's the point? It's nothing more than a novelty of seeing all these fine, sexy actors in the same film. Jesus...The Matrix worked with Keaneu Reeves and a host of un-sexy supporting actors! Would people appreciate this film as much if the biggest, sexiest name in it was Lawrence Fishburne? Not a chance. And not a knock on Fishburne, either. He just doesn't have the same level of appeal as the sexiest of the sexy.

 

Great sci-fi films make nobodies into stars. This film had stars playing nobodies.

 

In closing...it took this guy 10 years to write *this* movie? Only took me 148 minutes to figure out exactly what was wrong with it. Please tell me this is the first draft, because I can't imagine it ever being worse than it is.

 

Pretty much everything this film does wrong, The Matrix does right. They are very similar films in concept and design, and I believe it's worth comparing and contrasting the achievements of The Matrix to the failures of Inception. The Matrix is one of the best examples of intelligent sci-fi. Inception is perhaps the best example of the opposite.

 

The phrase 'turn-your-brain-off' is frequently used to describe movies that don't require much critical thinking, such as Commando. They are films that don't do many smart things, and just have a lot of explosions and gunfights without a great deal of substance.

 

This is one of those films. The Dark Knight is another. Lots of explosions and gunfights in place of clever ideas. Keep your brain on, use it, and you come away pissed off at the incompetence and end up writing 3242-word reviews on movies you don't even like.

 

At least the music was cool.

 

PS: The 'taking a scene from the middle and putting it at the beginning' gag reached peak effectiveness in 2002 and has absolutely no place in today's films. It's getting as bad as that tired old 'it's all a dream' scenario.

 

Oh, wait...

 

http://letterboxd.com/followtheblind/film/inception/

[Loki]

A really great, intelligent scifi movie has the effect that, when you leave the cinema, you're contemplating the implications of what you've seen. I remember after watching 6th Sense for the first time, I sat in a caf

[Devon Malcolm]

It had problems right from the outset. Firstly because I'm fucking sick of films that start with their ending. Secondly because Nolan decided to chuck the 'dream within a dream' thing in before he had even bothered to explain to us what the fuck they're doing in the first place.

 

I thought whilst I was watching it that I could see why people would think it's so brilliant, but actually I can't. It's a great idea absolutely frittered away under unnecessary layers of dull complexity, some really boring and uninspired action scenes and shootouts (can any of these cunts fucking shoot straight?) and worst of all, Michael Caine's only in it for about 10 minutes and Talulah Riley only gets a sodding cameo.

 

I absolutely don't get it. It's crap.

[NEWM]

Amongst all the joy and baby throwing when it came out, I disliked Inception straight away and was met with a torrent of grief off my mates for daring to attack the greatest piece of cinema ever. So glad the years are being unkinder to it. Heap of shite. It's made me want to see if I commented in here at the time and how the general consensus was then. People were going apeshit over it's amazingness, IIRC.

[Devon Malcolm]

Amongst all the joy and baby throwing when it came out, I disliked Inception straight away and was met with a torrent of grief off my mates for daring to attack the greatest piece of cinema ever. So glad the years are being unkinder to it. Heap of shite. It's made me want to see if I commented in here at the time and how the general consensus was then. People were going apeshit over it's amazingness, IIRC.

 

I would imagine said chatter about it happened earlier in this thread somewhere. I don't think there was a separate thread for it or anything.

 

But yes, the reaction round here was pretty much a microcosm of the general Nolan film reactions - lots of incredibly and bafflingly enthusiastic over-analysis and gushing praise against a small amount of grumbling criticism.

 

EDIT - Inception discussion starts here - http://ukff.com/index.php?s=&showtopic...t&p=2168865

Edited July 10, 2012 by Gladstone Small

[NEWM]

The Great UKFF Inception Divide!

 

For a bit of fun (!?), I did a search of Inception in this thread. It only brought up three pages of posts, so lets see the overall standings, and the odd views if they're worth reprinting:

 

Inception, number one!:

 

Stephanie -"...it's not very often I walk out of a cinema with chills. It was without a doubt the best film I have seen in years. I was completely amazed and will definitely be seeing it again at the next opportunity."

Jimmy kahoona

Harvey Dent - "Just saw Inception and was totally blown away. This film is totally incredible. Another powerhouse performance from DiCaprio, is there seriously anyone that doesn't rate him these days? Like the others I don't really want to say much, just do yourself a favour and go see it. Best film I've seen in years."

Shaneojack

Kookoocachu

jaimiekills

Scott Malbranque

Yoghurt - It's quite simply incredible. The acting, the story, the direction, everything is absolutely excellent. A genuine 10/10 classic.

Green

SpursRiot2012

RepoMan - "...I'm the kinda guy who will end up fucking hating something because it has been overhyped to the max, so regardless of how good it actually is I just hate it because I'm sick to death of it .. but this was fucking awesome."

iamgashface

KFR42

King Pitcos

stingersplash

Astro Hollycum

Rosegarden Funeral

 

Inception, hack phooey!:

 

Mr Seven(ish) - "...I didn't hate the film, I don't think it's shit and I did quite like it. Like I said, three out of five. However, don't believe the hype."

WildSybianRider

NEWM

aaron - "I thought it was a bit shit and want to slap the writers for misleading me with the awesome trailers. What a waste of time. If you like a SWERVE~ then, ok, you won't be pissed like I was."

CuckedByMenry

patfb

Slapnut

Keith Houchen

Loki

ozzfan

John Galt / Stone Cold Jane Austen - "A smart film for dumb people."

Trevor

 

 

And as a nice little bonus for those of us on the grumbling side:

 

Inception, as considered by pat:

 

Oh bollocks dont be saying its long. I'll never be able to sit through that in one go.

 

Thats the bastard cinema out.. again

 

Inception, as considered by Gladders two years ago before he finally got round to it:

 

I just want someone to tell me, without spoilers, that Inception is nothing like The Matrix before I go and see it. If it is then I'm not fucking interested

 

Inception, as considered by a rather irate post-cinema Steve Justice:

 

Watched Inception last night. I have no idea what went on or what the film was about because the annoying, noisy, mobile using cunts next to me distracted me for the majority of the film. They then left about an hour before it finished because "this films shit". HOW CAN YOU FORM AN OPINION ON A FILM THAT YOU HAVE TALKED AND TEXTED THROUGHOUT YOU HORRIBLE IGNORANT CUNTFUCK!

 

I may kill someone one day.

Edited July 10, 2012 by NEWM

[ozzfan]

I read that rant Gladstone posted and found myself getting angry and annoyed at Inception all over again. It's such a pile of over-long, pseudo-intellectual shite. I think I've said it before on this forum but Christopher Nolan is the middle class Michael Bay: Both are dreadful hacks who can't shoot action sequences to save their lives, the difference being that Nolan went to university and read an article about Descartes on wikipedia once.

 

Inception? Insipid more like, eh? Cuh!

[Devon Malcolm]

Add ozzfan to the 'Hack Phooey!' bit, NEWM.

 

Brilliant work, by the way. I'm sure that there were some votes for Inception on both the good and shit lists of the film poll I did but I deleted the PMs a while ago to find out who voted for it.

[The Cum Doctor]

I don't really sit on the "shit" or "good" side. I found it dull and didn't really give a shit about it. Didn't hate it or anything though.

[King Pitcos]

I stand by it.

 

[Devon Malcolm]

I don't really sit on the "shit" or "good" side. I found it dull and didn't really give a shit about it. Didn't hate it or anything though.

 

NEWM, create a 'Keith Houchen Memorial List'.

[NEWM]

Fence sitters need not apply. There's no real window of debate unless it rocked your balls or made you consider cutting them off in order to get the fuck away from it.

[Devon Malcolm]

Just dug these out from my emails for the Hack Phooey! list:-

 

John Galt / Stone Cold Jane Austen - "A smart film for dumb people."

Trevor

[Halitosis Romantic]

Well, if Galty and Big T. are a'gin it...

 

Put me down on the list of people what are fer it; at no point did it drag for me (aside from Batman Begins, nothing Nolan has done has ever felt like a chore).

[Devon Malcolm]

Woyzeck's in its good books:-

 

http://franticplanet.wordpress.com/2010/12...-2010-the-list/