The year Inception came out, 2010, was a good year in movies. However, most of the best picture nominees were derived from some other source. Inception was truly an original film, right next to Black Swan, and that's why it's still my favorite film of that year. And I'll tell you why: Watching it was and remains to this day, the most exciting time I've had at a movie in quite some time. I loved how it played with my mind, without cheating it. The film set up its premise and stuck with the rules it set up nearly the entire way. The moment that van rolled over in one dream, causing Joseph Gordon-Levitt's character to have to fight projections while his dream went ass-over-end, caused me to smile, a big Gandy-man smile (for those of you who remember the commercials). I was a boy again, enthralled with the images on the screen, thoroughly engaged with the storytelling, and loving every single second of it.
There are not many films I can say have had such an effect on me. At the moment, I can name four: Inception, The Dark Knight, Crash, and Schindler's List. The first two are exhilarating, tense experiences. The latter two, while also tense, are still two of the best movies to ever make me cry, and not just one tear; I'm talking about Alice in Wonderland crying. Such movies are rare, even among my long list of favorites.
Inception is unique in not only its storytelling--though I'm sure others will argue this point--but also in its combination of action and emotion. The film would not have been as good if not for the Cobb-Mal romance/dynamic. Yes, it would have been quite a good action film, but not nearly as effective.
Christopher Nolan knows how to keep his audience grounded in an emotional reality while everything around them is going to hell. He's done this before in Memento and will probably do it again. For Inception he provides two, shall I say "totems," to help us along the way: Cobb and Mal's love and Ariadne (played by Ellen Page). Both elements help to keep the audience "in the loop." Without them it would have been much easier for everyone to be lost. Ariadne serves her namesake quite well, for Cobb and for us.
Nolan himself once said that the film is about the process of making a movie, with the characters representing various jobs within the filmmaking process. However, the main reason I love the film so much is in how it deals with trauma. While in graduate school, I came across a literary theory that just seemed to speak to me (although I don't exactly know why): trauma. In our class, we discussed how trauma can be revealed and relieved in art, specifically film. To start, we had to understand how the mind reacts to and attempts to overcome traumatic memories.
At first, any traumatic event that is too much for the brain to handle is suppressed, locked away, until the brain can create a more manageable narrative of the event. The problem with this suppression is that frequently symptoms of the traumatic experience break through the suppression and manifest themselves in many different ways: such as irrational anger or crying over something others consider small.
Cobb has experienced a very traumatic event: the death of his wife. As the film progresses, Mal appears in his dreams, often acting against his own interests. Of course, the Mal Cobb sees is nothing more than his own guilt surfacing, angry at being forced into hiding. Until Cobb faces what happened, accepts his role in it, and forgives himself, he cannot be released from the traumatic memory.
Nolan follows this process by revealing Cobb's narrative, piece by piece, to Ariadne, and also to the audience. If the audience had known ahead of time what had happened, the film would not have worked quite as well. Indeed, we would have been cheated of the healing process. It doesn't matter if the spinning top at the end of the film ever falls. The more important point is that Cobb has stopped caring. He has found his reality. He no longer needs the dream. Nolan is asking where we are in our journey. Do we care whether it falls?
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