Inspecting Inception
I stole my sister this weekend. She stayed longer than she’s ever stayed before, a total of four days and three nights. It may not sound that long but it felt pretty awesome being able to have family in town so long. Dad and Janey came into town Thursday night. Dad left on Friday after Max grilled for all of us and I made desert (my berry compote). Janey and I spent the next couple days playing the new Sims expansion, going to the farmers market, showing her Fallout 3, eating sushi, watching Eddie Izzard, and on Sunday going to go see Inception.
The last movie we saw together was a few weeks ago: The Last Airbender. I already spoke my peace on how awful that was. Both of us agreed that we needed to see something to get that movie out of our minds forever, and both of us wanted to see Inception. So, we got up early, went to brunch at Tomato Head, got gelato (Azteca gelato= chocolate and cayenne flavored, and it blows my mind every time), and then got our seats.
The movie itself wasn’t bad. It wasn’t the best movie in the world, but Janey loved it, which is what mattered to me. However,t I (and, as I later found out, Max) twitched at a few things. No spoilers here, I promise:
For one, the main female character, a college architecture student, knew the answers to every one of the protagonist’s problems, always said the right thing, and if she had any character flaws they were never truly explored *cough Mary Sue cough*. It was painful to see such a “perfect” character in a movie with such an interesting and flawed protagonist. She just didn’t fit.
Second were the psychological elements that were not addressed at all. These people were running around in other people’s subconscious minds. There was a lack interesting symbolism (the best we got was “rain” for when one of the characters was sad), no playing with Freudian theory at all, and not even a stereotypical melting clock (throw me a bone here, Nolan). The only psychological concept brushed past was cognitive dissonance, which was mistakenly called “catharsis” a few times in the movie before it was rushed through.
That set aside, I found the main character fascinating, his manifestation of guilt in his dreams done spledidly, the uncertainty of reality riveting, and it kept me so involved I involuntarily yelled, “DAMNIT!” at the end of the movie. It was worth seeing; I just wish they’d done a little more.
And this scene made me happy.
I’d say it was a great weekend. I wish my family could come in town like that every month.
The last movie we saw together was a few weeks ago: The Last Airbender. I already spoke my peace on how awful that was. Both of us agreed that we needed to see something to get that movie out of our minds forever, and both of us wanted to see Inception. So, we got up early, went to brunch at Tomato Head, got gelato (Azteca gelato= chocolate and cayenne flavored, and it blows my mind every time), and then got our seats.
The movie itself wasn’t bad. It wasn’t the best movie in the world, but Janey loved it, which is what mattered to me. However,t I (and, as I later found out, Max) twitched at a few things. No spoilers here, I promise:
For one, the main female character, a college architecture student, knew the answers to every one of the protagonist’s problems, always said the right thing, and if she had any character flaws they were never truly explored *cough Mary Sue cough*. It was painful to see such a “perfect” character in a movie with such an interesting and flawed protagonist. She just didn’t fit.
Second were the psychological elements that were not addressed at all. These people were running around in other people’s subconscious minds. There was a lack interesting symbolism (the best we got was “rain” for when one of the characters was sad), no playing with Freudian theory at all, and not even a stereotypical melting clock (throw me a bone here, Nolan). The only psychological concept brushed past was cognitive dissonance, which was mistakenly called “catharsis” a few times in the movie before it was rushed through.
That set aside, I found the main character fascinating, his manifestation of guilt in his dreams done spledidly, the uncertainty of reality riveting, and it kept me so involved I involuntarily yelled, “DAMNIT!” at the end of the movie. It was worth seeing; I just wish they’d done a little more.
And this scene made me happy.
I’d say it was a great weekend. I wish my family could come in town like that every month.