Where's your evidence to support that theory? I'm not attacking you, it's just apparently multiple people are convinced about it
-
Welcome to Smogon! Take a moment to read the Introduction to Smogon for a run-down on everything Smogon, and make sure you take some time to read the global rules.
-
Congrats to the winners of the 2023 Smog Awards!
Inception (spoilers)
- Thread starter Stoo
- Start date
The seeing the kids faces arguement is rather flawed. Cobbs always had a chance to see his kids faces in his dreams but he always avoided them knowing it would confuse his reality and dreams.
On the other hand, the top wobbled so it's real is a valid point. Maybe an infinite top does wobble and straighten but from what we've been shown, they spin rather perfectly in dreams.
Speaking of the top, how does it work? If the dream is real enough for everyone to believe and everything and everyone follows friction, how is it the top is able the defy it?
But really, who spent the entire movie begging to see the kids faces just once?
On the other hand, the top wobbled so it's real is a valid point. Maybe an infinite top does wobble and straighten but from what we've been shown, they spin rather perfectly in dreams.
Speaking of the top, how does it work? If the dream is real enough for everyone to believe and everything and everyone follows friction, how is it the top is able the defy it?
But really, who spent the entire movie begging to see the kids faces just once?
Why is it flawed? Cobb's dreams weren't really dreams but memories. He mentions that using these select few memories is the only way he can dream. The only memory he has of his children is when he is advised to flee the country so he doesn't see their faces. He regrets that moment because he was momentarily distracted and has a difficult time remembering, thus a difficult time recreating, what they look like. This is why I think showing their faces at the end proves he was in reality and why you never see their faces otherwise. Mol, on the other hand, was very lifelike and real despite being dead because of how well he knew her inside and out. Regardless of the select few memories he carried of her, he was very easily able to recreate her but as he mentions in the 4th dream level, not to the point to truly capture all of her perfections and imperfections that made her who she was. If that makes sense.. Anyway, the point with Mol is that Cobb didn't know his children as well as he knew his wife and couldn't just summon up their faces at will like he could hers.
The visuals, special effects, and sound were simply outstanding.
The plot was a bit complicated to follow, though.
The plot was a bit complicated to follow, though.
Raj
CAP Playtesting Expert
As for the final outcome of the movie, I'm thinking that he's lost in dream. I was thinking about it and he said that you're not supposed to use memories for dream construction because it confuses the person, which is exactly what I believe happened to him. When his wife committed suicide, they were in a dream and she went back into existence and he didn't because he thought it was real. Because the top was her creation and not his, and because of the inability to tell dream from reality, the spinning top proved powerless to him.
One problem with your theory, it doesn't matter who the owner of the totem is, only that you understand how it works. Cobb knew exactly how it worked, and therefore it was his totem after mol died. A totem only "works" for one person, because the whole point is that one person is the only person who knows how it works, if one were to figure out someone else's totem they could use it as their own, but would have a liability if the original owner was alive and wanted to trap them in a dream.
Me and my buddy were studying psychology this summer and this film was such a good hit. The ending made me kept wondering which part of the film is real and which isn't. I think the whole thing was a dream though. Cobb was probably dreaming all of that during his sleep on the flight trip. Other characters that we see have no association with him whatsoever. They were just flight passengers that Cobb had seen before going to sleep or people that he knew. Just pay attention to the ending and you'll see it! It's amazing if everything was Cobb's dream. Especially with that 5 stages of dreams.
Inception was a very interesting film for this summer. Two thumbs up. Really recommending others to go watch if they haven't seen it yet.
Inception was a very interesting film for this summer. Two thumbs up. Really recommending others to go watch if they haven't seen it yet.
I just saw it tonight and it was enjoyable. The plot and score were both fantastic. However, I really didn't like how Nolan portrayed dreams. They were far too structured and realistic, and didn't reflect at all how illogical they can be. Also, the dream rules about waking up, etc wouldn't stand up to any logical scrutiny, which bothered me the entire movie.
The last half contained too much action imo, which felt inconsistent with the themes of the film, and didn't let the film develop into anything cerebral. The ending scene seemed like the obvious way to end a movie about dreams, but it didn't do anything for me because I really didn't believe the implications or consequences of whether he was dreaming were that significant.
The last half contained too much action imo, which felt inconsistent with the themes of the film, and didn't let the film develop into anything cerebral. The ending scene seemed like the obvious way to end a movie about dreams, but it didn't do anything for me because I really didn't believe the implications or consequences of whether he was dreaming were that significant.
Did anyone else come out of it subconsciously looking for a personal totem?
Saw the movie earlier tonight and found it to be absolutely brilliant, Christopher Nolan delivers the goods as usual, and the cast was top quality.
Just some ideas I had that maybe some of you can help me with:
1. How did Cobb and his wife end up spending 50 years in a limbo dream in the first place? It would appear that the triple dream sedation thing had never been tried before so they had some other way of reaching limbo dream and just decided to settle there?
2. They set up limbo dream as this inescapable place and that's why they can't let Saito die, but then it turns out all you need to do is kill yourself in the limbo dream to get out? Why doesn't Saito just do that instead of living as a lonely old man?
3. Cobb's dream elevator was also a bit confusing. I think he constructs that elevator every time he sleeps to explore his memories, can someone confirm this.
4. Showing Cobb and Mal in their present age lying on the train tracks in order to die and escape was unnecessary, Cobb had clearly stated before they he and Mal spent 50 years in limbo so they should have been old in that scene.
5. To me there was no question that the ending scene indicated that Cobb was back in real life, his totem was starting to wobble and as the film has established if he was still dreaming there was no way he would've seen his kids' faces since he appeared to not have memory of their faces.
There might be more questions when I think of them, they are intended to provoke discussion and not really criticism as such. Even if there were confusing points for me it did not detract from this immensely entertaining and cerebral film in anyway.
Just some ideas I had that maybe some of you can help me with:
1. How did Cobb and his wife end up spending 50 years in a limbo dream in the first place? It would appear that the triple dream sedation thing had never been tried before so they had some other way of reaching limbo dream and just decided to settle there?
2. They set up limbo dream as this inescapable place and that's why they can't let Saito die, but then it turns out all you need to do is kill yourself in the limbo dream to get out? Why doesn't Saito just do that instead of living as a lonely old man?
3. Cobb's dream elevator was also a bit confusing. I think he constructs that elevator every time he sleeps to explore his memories, can someone confirm this.
4. Showing Cobb and Mal in their present age lying on the train tracks in order to die and escape was unnecessary, Cobb had clearly stated before they he and Mal spent 50 years in limbo so they should have been old in that scene.
5. To me there was no question that the ending scene indicated that Cobb was back in real life, his totem was starting to wobble and as the film has established if he was still dreaming there was no way he would've seen his kids' faces since he appeared to not have memory of their faces.
There might be more questions when I think of them, they are intended to provoke discussion and not really criticism as such. Even if there were confusing points for me it did not detract from this immensely entertaining and cerebral film in anyway.
I think the main thing people miss about this movie is that there is no "right" answer to whether the top fell or not at the end. It was left open-ended on purpose. I think the most praise-worthy aspect of the movie was its ability to live up to its name. It infects people who watch it with a bunch of ideas. (Not everyone mind you, at work I overheard somebody saying they had just got back from the movie Interception starring Leonardo DaVinci)
I find it hard to argue that Cobb was actually awake at the end because the layer of reality that the movie tells you is the real world is very dream like by the movies definition of dream like. You never see how characters get from point A to point B. Cobb is being chased by some unknown corporation trying to kill him with no explanation (not unlike Fischer's trained projections.) The characters never have any real interaction with people other than other main characters. There are other things like how does Eames infiltrate Fischer's company in the "real" world? and why is Cobb's homecoming scene _exactly_ like his memory? They never show characters eating or sleeping, etc. The film was put together to be extremely dream-like even in the "real" world.
@Fatecrashers:
1. They were testing the dream technology and were testing setting up dreams inside dreams without sedation. This is supposedly dangerous because the more layers you add the more likely it is that the dreams will collapse and you'll get lost in limbo.
2. Saito didn't kill himself until Cobb found him because he didn't know he was dreaming.
4. The point of them being young the first time they show the train scene and old the second time is because Cobb is coming to term with his relationship with his wife and her death. His projection of Mol accuses him of leaving her saying that they were supposed to grow old together. He, at the end, reasons with her, "We did grow old together." and that's when they show them as being old on the train tracks.
5. I think this is a pretty weak argument. See my reasoning for it being a dream above. Also, I think it's possible that everything Cobb says and believes could be false. It could be that he and Mol were trapped in limbo and he was the one that couldn't realize it was a dream and wake up. So she tried to plant the idea that it was a dream in his head but failed. And to rationalize his wife's "suicide" he misremembers it as having happened the way we saw it in the movie. In this way the Mol projections would represent his subconscious telling him it's all a dream and he needs to wake up. Which explains her motivation. She's not his guilt, she's the virus-like idea that Cobb's world is not real.
@Jackal: As for real life questions, someone I talked about the movie to suggested that movie was an allegory for moving on after a tragedy. Cobb needs to come to terms with the fact that his wife is dead and that a world without her is his reality now and he needs to be happy with it.
@Inceptions version of dream world: I don't think it's far too realistic. Dreams always feel real while we're in them (unless lucid dreaming.) It has some of the important aspects of dreams that I mentioned above. Going from point A to point B but not knowing how, not interacting with things around you other than certain people, etc. Also, the time dilation effect is pretty common in dreams, I think. I've also seen it referenced in movies/books/shows before so I'd assume most people notice it. Also, for anyone looking to get into lucid dreaming and wanting to have a "totem" to help you realize when you're dreaming. Star wearing a watch and looking at it frequently. If you look at it in a dream you may realize you're dreaming when you see that' it's cheesburger o'clock.
I find it hard to argue that Cobb was actually awake at the end because the layer of reality that the movie tells you is the real world is very dream like by the movies definition of dream like. You never see how characters get from point A to point B. Cobb is being chased by some unknown corporation trying to kill him with no explanation (not unlike Fischer's trained projections.) The characters never have any real interaction with people other than other main characters. There are other things like how does Eames infiltrate Fischer's company in the "real" world? and why is Cobb's homecoming scene _exactly_ like his memory? They never show characters eating or sleeping, etc. The film was put together to be extremely dream-like even in the "real" world.
@Fatecrashers:
1. They were testing the dream technology and were testing setting up dreams inside dreams without sedation. This is supposedly dangerous because the more layers you add the more likely it is that the dreams will collapse and you'll get lost in limbo.
2. Saito didn't kill himself until Cobb found him because he didn't know he was dreaming.
4. The point of them being young the first time they show the train scene and old the second time is because Cobb is coming to term with his relationship with his wife and her death. His projection of Mol accuses him of leaving her saying that they were supposed to grow old together. He, at the end, reasons with her, "We did grow old together." and that's when they show them as being old on the train tracks.
5. I think this is a pretty weak argument. See my reasoning for it being a dream above. Also, I think it's possible that everything Cobb says and believes could be false. It could be that he and Mol were trapped in limbo and he was the one that couldn't realize it was a dream and wake up. So she tried to plant the idea that it was a dream in his head but failed. And to rationalize his wife's "suicide" he misremembers it as having happened the way we saw it in the movie. In this way the Mol projections would represent his subconscious telling him it's all a dream and he needs to wake up. Which explains her motivation. She's not his guilt, she's the virus-like idea that Cobb's world is not real.
@Jackal: As for real life questions, someone I talked about the movie to suggested that movie was an allegory for moving on after a tragedy. Cobb needs to come to terms with the fact that his wife is dead and that a world without her is his reality now and he needs to be happy with it.
@Inceptions version of dream world: I don't think it's far too realistic. Dreams always feel real while we're in them (unless lucid dreaming.) It has some of the important aspects of dreams that I mentioned above. Going from point A to point B but not knowing how, not interacting with things around you other than certain people, etc. Also, the time dilation effect is pretty common in dreams, I think. I've also seen it referenced in movies/books/shows before so I'd assume most people notice it. Also, for anyone looking to get into lucid dreaming and wanting to have a "totem" to help you realize when you're dreaming. Star wearing a watch and looking at it frequently. If you look at it in a dream you may realize you're dreaming when you see that' it's cheesburger o'clock.
Just found this graphic of the Inception timeline, what do you guys think? Clarifying or confusing?
I have no idea why you guys all had such trouble following the level of the dream. All you have to be able to do is count the FOUR distinct areas.
The ending was also much less mysterious then people were saying; the top falling or not falling would only define the last scene as being dream or not dream, not the rest of the movie.
It was still good, though. Arthur's fight in shifting gravity will possibly be as format defining as bullet-time was post-Matrix.
EDIT: Also, I think that diagram is incorrect; I thought the whole point was that the snow-filled dream was actually Fisher's dream, and they were pretending it was his godfathers to trick him into putting the machine on.
EDIT 2: Also, was the final scene with the kids exactly the same? I thought the kids were in a different position.
The ending was also much less mysterious then people were saying; the top falling or not falling would only define the last scene as being dream or not dream, not the rest of the movie.
It was still good, though. Arthur's fight in shifting gravity will possibly be as format defining as bullet-time was post-Matrix.
EDIT: Also, I think that diagram is incorrect; I thought the whole point was that the snow-filled dream was actually Fisher's dream, and they were pretending it was his godfathers to trick him into putting the machine on.
EDIT 2: Also, was the final scene with the kids exactly the same? I thought the kids were in a different position.
I think each dream contains 3 elements: the architecture, the host and the subconscious projections.
Hence the first 3 levels were hosted by Yusuf, Arthur and Eames respectively, Ariadne was responsible for the designs of the streets, the hotel and the mountain, while Fischer's subconscious populated the dreams with his projections.
If you look at it that way then the diagram is correct.
Hence the first 3 levels were hosted by Yusuf, Arthur and Eames respectively, Ariadne was responsible for the designs of the streets, the hotel and the mountain, while Fischer's subconscious populated the dreams with his projections.
If you look at it that way then the diagram is correct.
When the van was falling, the hotel dream sequence had zero gravity. I don't understand why this didn't continue to the snow dream. The only explanation I can think of is that it actually did, but since each new level of dream minimizes effects, the audience cannot tell that the effect of gravity was weakened.
@darkie: The falling car in the 1st level caused the zero gravity in the 2nd level, however the only person the zero gravity really affected was Arthur since he was the one bouncing off the walls while everyone else was asleep and floating in mid-air. Since Eames was the host of the 3rd level it makes sense that zero gravity doesn't carry over to the snowy mountains because Eames was floating almost stationarily.
@Emi: Mal is so deeply ingrained in Cobb's subconscious as a guilty memory that she shows up as a projection in most of the dream levels that he is in, same thing for Cobb's children. Cobb admits it as such when he tells Ariadne that he can no longer design dreamscapes and she should not tell him her architectural plans because Mal will almost certainly show up and sabotage the operation.
Also, I just found out that a familiar musical cue present in the film is just Edith Piaf's 'Je ne Regrette Rien' (the French song they play as a cue to kick themselves out of the dream) slowed down, and apparently it slows down the more levels they descend in the dreamscape as a demonstration of their relative time slowing down.
This video explains it somewhat: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UVkQ0C4qDvM&feature=player_embedded
@Emi: Mal is so deeply ingrained in Cobb's subconscious as a guilty memory that she shows up as a projection in most of the dream levels that he is in, same thing for Cobb's children. Cobb admits it as such when he tells Ariadne that he can no longer design dreamscapes and she should not tell him her architectural plans because Mal will almost certainly show up and sabotage the operation.
Also, I just found out that a familiar musical cue present in the film is just Edith Piaf's 'Je ne Regrette Rien' (the French song they play as a cue to kick themselves out of the dream) slowed down, and apparently it slows down the more levels they descend in the dreamscape as a demonstration of their relative time slowing down.
This video explains it somewhat: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UVkQ0C4qDvM&feature=player_embedded
I wish I was this eloquent because it pretty much says everything i wanted to say. I found the film OK but not nearly as good as everyone here/in the world made it out to be . I'll expand on a couple of points. The rules of the final dream were completely illogical - at times they made sense and were abided to, but at others Nolan pretty much gave up on them when it suited him. ( I thought once you were in limbo you were fucked and your brain would be scrambled, which was not really a massive incentive not to die as cobb was himself functional regarding his experience in limbo) I guess in a sci-fi esque film rules can be bent but i think the main reason this film irritated me was the stupid plot. Why was it so gravely necessary to perform inception in the first place? Who cares if the one company becomes larger than the other, in fact wouldn't the japanese guys company become larger as a result thus worse. Then there was the final level of the dream which was just a bad version of james bond.
All in all not great. My greatest enjoyment from the film came from the ironic circumstance of my friend falling asleep during the film.
I also found it patronising that Nolan supplies the audience with the supposed revelation that reality is or could be a dream. I think most of us have already seen the matrix. The ending seems fitting but in fact its a lazy and contrived and an easy way for Nolan to strengthen through obscurity his half formed ideas.
This doesn't work, because Arthur is asleep in the van and is still affected by the shift of gravity. I think the only consistent explanation is the deterioration in effect as you go deeper.
The van falling in the 1st level either caused the absence of gravity in the 2nd level or it didn't. I think you're saying that it didn't but my interpretation is that it did. Otherwise it's difficult explaining why gravity exists in the 1st and 3rd levels but not the 2nd, and I don't think the deterioration theory explains satisfactorily this skip in gravity.
I'll try to clarify my position:
1. The 2nd dream level is hosted by Arthur, designed by Ariadne and populated by Fischer's projections.
2. Arthur's body in the 1st level is experiencing a weightlessness because he is seated inside the falling van.
3. This experience of weightless does exist in real life, as seen by astronauts who train for zero gravity by floating inside jet planes which have been put into a temporary nosedive.
4. This weightlessness sensation translates to a lack of gravity inside the 2nd level.
5. The lack of gravity does not occur inside the 3rd level because this level is hosted by the sleeping Eames in the 2nd level.
6. Though Eames is sleeping in a zero gravity situation he is lying completely still, the sensation he experience is no different from him lying on a solid bed.
7. Because a motionless Eames doesn't actually experience weightlessness as opposed to the falling Arthur, gravity still exists in the 3rd level.
I watched it last night.
It was not ALL a dream. After all, the top get spinned at some point of the film and DOES drop, suggesting that THAT point was real.
I think the only part that we thought was real and in fact was a dream was from the point the main actor wakes up on the flight till the end. That is a dream. The rest (obviously except the dreams they were in) was real. How the hell did he manage to extricate himself out of the dream from the dream from the dream anyway? The film was not clear about that.
Just my post-assessment.
It was not ALL a dream. After all, the top get spinned at some point of the film and DOES drop, suggesting that THAT point was real.
I think the only part that we thought was real and in fact was a dream was from the point the main actor wakes up on the flight till the end. That is a dream. The rest (obviously except the dreams they were in) was real. How the hell did he manage to extricate himself out of the dream from the dream from the dream anyway? The film was not clear about that.
Just my post-assessment.