[Image at left from the Wikipedia 'Inception' page; "Inception (2010) theatrical poster",[a] licensed under fair use via Wikipedia.]
Welcome to the analysis of Inception. Buttons at the bottom of each post enable navigation through the parts of the analysis.
A description and a plot synopsis of the movie follow.
Inception is a 2010 science fiction/action heist film written, co-produced, and directed by Christopher Nolan. The film stars a large ensemble cast that includes Leonardo DiCaprio, Ken Watanabe, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Marion Cotillard, Ellen Page, Tom Hardy, Dileep Rao, Cillian Murphy, Tom Berenger, and Michael Caine.
Plot
Dominick "Dom" Cobb (above left) and Arthur (above right) are "extractors", who perform corporate espionage using an experimental military technology to infiltrate the subconscious of their targets and extract valuable information through a shared dream world. Their latest target, Japanese businessman Saito, reveals that he arranged their mission himself to test Cobb for a seemingly-impossible job: planting an idea in a person's subconscious, or "inception".
Japanese businessman Saito.
To break up the energy conglomerate of ailing competitor Maurice Fischer, Saito wants Cobb to convince Fischer's son and heir, Robert, to dissolve his father's company. In return, Saito promises to use his influence to clear Cobb of a murder charge, allowing Cobb to return home to his children. Cobb accepts the offer and assembles his team: Eames, a conman and identity forger; Yusuf, a chemist who concocts a powerful sedative for a stable "dream within a dream" strategy, Ariadne, an architecture student tasked with designing the labyrinth of the dream landscapes, recruited with the help of Cobb's father-in-law, Professor Stephen Miles. While dream-sharing with Cobb, Ariadne learns his subconscious houses an invasive projection of his late wife Mal.
Above left: Eames, a conman and identity forger. Above right: Yusuf, a chemist.
Ariadne, an architecture student.
Above left: Doms's late wife, Mallory 'Mal' Cobb. Above right: Professor Stephen Miles.
When the elder Fischer dies in Sydney, Robert Fischer accompanies the body on a ten-hour flight back to Los Angeles, which the team (including Saito, who wants to verify their success) uses as an opportunity to sedate and take Fischer into a shared dream. At each dream level, the person generating the dream stays behind to set up a "kick" that will be used to awaken the other sleeping team members from the deeper dream level. The plan is for Yusuf to drive off a bridge in the first level, Arthur to use the elevator in the second level, and Eames to create an explosion in the third level simultaneously.
Robert Fischer.
The first level is Yusuf's dream of a rainy Los Angeles. The team abducts Fischer, but they are attacked by armed projections from Fischer's subconscious, which has been trained to defend against extraction. The team takes Fischer and a wounded Saito to a warehouse, where Cobb reveals that while dying in the dream would normally wake Saito up, the powerful sedatives needed to stabilize the multi-level dream will instead send a dying dreamer into "limbo", a world of infinite subconscious from which it is very difficult to escape. Despite these setbacks, the team continues with the mission.
Eames impersonates Fischer's godfather, Peter Browning (Tom Berenger), to suggest Fischer reconsider his father's will. Yusuf drives the van as the other dreamers are sedated into the second level.
Eames impersonating Peter Browning.
In the second level, a hotel dreamed by Arthur, Cobb convinces Fischer that he has been kidnapped by Browning and Cobb is his subconscious protector. Cobb persuades him to go down another level to explore Browning's subconscious (in 'reality', it is a ruse to enter Fischer's).
The third level is a snowy mountain fortress dreamed by Eames. The team has to infiltrate it and hold off the guards as Cobb takes Fischer into the equivalent of his subconscious.
Yusuf, under pursuit by Fischer's projections in the first level, accidentally drives off a bridge and initiates his kick too soon. This removes the gravity of Arthur's level, forcing him to improvise a new kick that will synchronize with the van hitting the water, and causes an avalanche in Eames' level. The Mal projection kills Fischer, Cobb kills Mal, and Saito succumbs to his wounds; all three fall into limbo. While Eames sets up a kick by rigging the fortress with explosives, Cobb and Ariadne enter limbo to rescue Fischer and Saito.
Cobb reveals to Ariadne that he and Mal went to limbo while experimenting with the dream-sharing technology. There, they spent fifty years constructing a world from their shared memories. When Mal refused to return to 'reality', Cobb used a rudimentary form of inception by compromising her totem (an object dreamers use to distinguish dreams from 'reality') and implanted in her mind the idea that the world was not real. However, when she woke up, Mal was still convinced that she was dreaming. In an attempt to "wake up" for real, Mal committed suicide and framed Cobb for her death to force him to do the same. Facing a murder charge, Cobb fled the U.S., leaving his children in the care of Professor Miles.
Dom and Mal together.
Through his confession, Cobb makes peace with his guilt over Mal's death. Ariadne kills the Mal projection and wakes Fischer up with a kick. Revived at the mountain fortress, Fischer enters a safe room to discover and accept the planted idea: a projection of his dying father telling him to be his own man. While Cobb remains in limbo to search for Saito, the other team members ride the synchronized kicks back to 'reality': Ariadne jumps off a balcony, Eames detonates the explosives in the fortress, Arthur blasts an elevator containing the team's sleeping bodies up the shaft, and the van hits the water. Cobb eventually finds an aged Saito in limbo, reminding him of their agreement. The dreamers all awaken on the plane and Saito makes a phone call.
Upon arrival at Los Angeles Airport, Cobb passes the U.S. immigration checkpoint and Professor Miles accompanies him to his home. Cobb spins his spinning top to verify he is not still dreaming, but leaves it spinning on the table to join his children in the garden.[b]
Dom reunites with his children.
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Ending
Nolan has also said, "I don't remember specifically where the idea [for stealing an idea] came from except that once I started exploring the idea of people sharing a dream space - entering a dream space and sharing a dream. That gives you the ability to access somebody's subconscious. What would that be used and abused for? That was the jumping off point."[d]
a. Poster for Inception: The poster art copyright is believed to belong to the distributor of the film, Warner Bros. Pictures, the publisher of the film or the graphic artist.
b. Wikipedia, Inception. Web, n.d. URL = https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inception.
c. Jensen, Jeff (November 30, 2010). "Christopher Nolan on his 'last' Batman movie, an 'Inception' videogame, and that spinning top." Entertainment Weekly. Web. URL = http://www.ew.com/article/2010/11/30/christopher-nolan-batman-inception.
d. Weintraub, Steve (March 25, 2010). "Christopher Nolan and Emma Thomas Interview." Collider.com. Web. URL = http://collider.com/director-christopher-nolan-and-producer-emma-thomas-interview-inception-they-talk-3d-what-kind-of-cameras-they-used-pre-viz-wb-and-a-lot-more/.
