The "Inception" Thread

[mousepod]

No, it doesn't. Clearly, every non-documentary movie takes place entirely in fantasy, so your 13-year-old girl idea could be true for anything.

What I'm saying is that there is an internal logic for the movie.

Spoiler:

But there are two stories. The plot about Saito and Fischer is the Macguffin, but it's also a roadmap to the real story, which is the Adriadne (?) and Cobb story.

[Alex]

Oops, forgot the spoiler tag.

Spoiler:

And I'd argue that you're just picking and choosing which statements in the movie you wish to decide were true, and having stipulated that the movie is never presenting an objective reality there is no basis on which to make those decisions.

If the whole thing is a dream is there any reality to the idea of totems and how they work? No way of knowing. Is there any reality to the idea of limbo? No way of knowing. Is there any reality to the idea of projections and how they behave? No way of knowing. Each can be used or discarded as needed in pursuit of any theory as it can now be explained as a necessary component or just a lie used to achieve the predetermined goal.

I could just as easily, in my opinion, argue that the entire movie is a dream but the goal was to take dream researcher Cobb and get him break his ethical vows in order to commit an act of inception on Fischer and that actually the last scene after waking up is really the first time Cobb has been awake in the movie and his weird dream is making him uneasy as he goes through customs. After all, nothing in those final scenes explicitly mentions that he was on the run from the law. Maybe he was actually on his way back from a scholarly convention in Europe where he was waylayed by Saito and his crew.

[innerSpaceman]

FVCK Spoilers: DON'T READ IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN INCEPTION.


Sorry, but once there are 18 posts in a row that require spoiler tags, for a movie that's the talk of the town and has been out for 12 days, I'm officially calling spoiler tags OFF for my posts.


mousepod: I love your theory, as I understand it. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it's simply adding a rationale for Cobb's dream - as to who would be invading it and why. From what I can glean, this encompasses the general theory of the entire movie being his dream. That takes care of my gaping plot hole (and no, Alex, obstacles in dreams are not solved by simply making them disappear by virtue of the dreamer's godly power of creation) ... but what about the scenes in the film where Cobb does not appear? Are these ok with you?

[Alex]

Originally Posted by innerSpaceman

(and no, Alex, obstacles in dreams are not solved by simply making them disappear by virtue of the dreamer's godly power of creation)

Why not?

If the whole thing is a dream then all the stuff about totems is bull**** that must have been foisted off on Cobb somehow, even though he's an expert in this stuff. Presumably it is a tool to strengthen Cobb's belief that the first dream level is the real world. Or we have to assume that Cobb's totem was compromised off screen since it is shown working (that is, falling).

Secondly, all the stuff about Limbo is bull**** because that level is then simply another constructed level used to reach Cobb's final catharsis.

Are there really different layers of dreaming or is it all just actually single layer with them moving from one part of the maze to another? Is there really any time dilation in dreams, there's no longer any objective reason to believe so since we have no knowledge of how fast time is passing in reality. Is the stuff about sedatives all just made up to strengthen the reality of the fake? The explanation of aggressive projections must be a lie (but they're a bit of a plot hole anyway) story since presumably Fischer is a co-conspirator and perfectly aware he's dreaming.

All that's left is "you can share dreams and in doing so impact their reality." Everything else in the movie can be accepted or dismissed at will without impacting the credibility of that conclusion. But even that isn't entirely there, why can't it be that the whole movie is the natural dream of a damaged psyche working through guilt over his wife (that is, maybe the whole movie is the dream of DiCaprio's character from Shutter Island).

So, having determined that two or more of the core rules of this presented world are lies, what else is a lie and how do you decide?

That's my view of the "it's all a dream" theory anyway.

[mousepod]

Are we going spoiler-free? OK.

I actually tried to be objective in "picking and choosing which statements in the movie ... were true".

I took all of the information about the technology, totems, "architecture", and limbo (i.e. all of the stuff that relates to the act of entering and manipulating dreams) as true for the movie. The only information I took to be not reliable was the information about specific individuals.

[innerSpaceman]

Alex - absolutely, you could interpret the entire movie like that if you choose.

I don't think it's at all out of line to assume that Nolan left all of this open to interpretation. Certainly the ending was specifically designed to leave one wondering if Cobb was awake or not.

For a movie about dreams within dreams within dreams within dreams, where one of the presentations of the real world is purposefully twisted to leave it open as to whether it's been a dream, I don't see how it's not a legitimate, filmmaker-intended avenue of theoretical pursuit to imagine some or all of the other "real world" segments to be dreams.

In which case, yeah, your 13-year-old girl theory is as legit as any other, including the one where Cobb breaks his ethical vow (except, uh, what vow? - He never seemed to have any compunctions about performing inception, though of course he was embarrassed to reveal details of the time he successfully did it. Despite that, he seemed damned anxious to do it again. Hardly breaking an ethical vow.)

[mousepod]

... and iSm: the scenes where Cobb does not appear (in my opinion) should be taken as clues to who the 'dreamer' is.

[innerSpaceman]

Originally Posted by mousepod

... and iSm: the scenes where Cobb does not appear (in my opinion) should be taken as clues to who the 'dreamer' is.

Then what about the scenes where Arthur does not appear? Or where neither of them do?

[Alex]

Originally Posted by innerSpaceman

Then what about the scenes where Arthur does not appear? Or where neither of them do?

If we assume the dreamer has to be present (which there's no reason to actually assume, Arthur is presented as the dreamer of the Hotel Level and so it is the scenes with Cobb and other people where Arthur isn't presented that have to be explained within the presented framework of the movie).

You just have to have a frequent transfer of who the controlling dreamer is.

There are scenes without Cobb (add to the list the first scene of Fischer and his dad on his deathbed; the other only crew member present for that is Eames).
There are scenes where Cobb is alone (of the top of my head) with Ariadne (late night bull session), his father (when he goes to get a new architect), Eames (the bar where we first meet him), and Arthur (the hotel room in Kyoto).

There is nobody who is present for every scene of the "reality" level.

[mousepod]

Originally Posted by Alex

If we assume the dreamer has to be present (which there's no reason to actually assume, Arthur is presented as the dreamer of the Hotel Level and so it is the scenes with Cobb and other people where Arthur isn't presented that have to be explained within the presented framework of the movie).

Good point. I completely forgot about that. So the absence of Cobb from any scene isn't a plot hole at all. Nice.

There are scenes where Cobb is alone (of the top of my head) with Ariadne (late night bull session), his father (when he goes to get a new architect), Eames (the bar where we first meet him), and Arthur (the hotel room in Kyoto).

I'm fairly certain that they present Miles as Mal's father, not Cobb's. Perhaps he's the one who is trying to get Cobb to admit that he performed inception on his daughter.

What if Mal isn't dead, but in some kind of permanent dream state? If she was the dreamer, that might explain why Cobb uses her totem - and why her "secret" was the totem itself.