4/5. Though I will say when I left the theater, I had a weird feeling, which is rarely the case after seeing any movie. I felt…happy? The movie was sort of heavy all the way through, so maybe that’s why after seeing it my mood felt lighter. I dunno.
OrangeCat, please don’t take offense to me completely dismissing your opinion without going into any detail whatsoever:
I think you’re completely wrong.
Anyway, questions for the thread about the basics of the whole reality:
dual input
[details=Spoiler]So earlier in the film we have Leo’s character explaining to Ellen Page’s character that when you enter someone’s mind, you have two parts (at least)- the person’s subconscious, and the sort of map of the world created by the other party. This is why he needed her to be the architect.
When Cillian Murphy’s character gets roofied on the plane and they enter his mind… I don’t understand what happens to this line of reasoning after this point.
Let’s look at it like we have 5 or so levels:
-Reality
-Level 1 (Warehouse, van driving into river)
-Level 2 (Hotel, elevator shaft shenanigans)
-Level 3 (Snow, the vault)
-Level 4 (Going back to Leo’s old map that he made with his wife, old man Watanabe(?))
Cillian Murphy gets jumped, we enter level 1. Cool. He gets put under in the van, and we enter level 2. But at that point, who’s map is it? Murphy’s character is supplying the subconscious henchmen and NPCs, right? So who’s world map is it? Shit, who’s was it in level 1? I would assume DiCaprio’s, except that it was stated directly that he can’t know the layout, or his wife will rush everyone’s shit down. And how can Leo’s kids/train be in Level 1/2 etc? It’s not his map or his subconscious, so why are his thoughts leaking into these worlds?
So we’re at Level 2, the hotel. Clearly we’re still dealing with Murphy’s NPCs/security, and that never seems to change. Then everyone but Joseph Gordon-Levitt gets put under again, and we go to level 3. Watanabe has been shot, and Murphy gets shot here. Gayish Brit Guy is setting up mine traps and doing his thing, and then Leo and Ellen Page go down another level to get Murphy before he dies.
Level 4. Murphy gets tossed off the side of the building/gets shocked and goes back to Level 3, where he goes into the vault with his dad in it. Ellen Page hits her reset button as everyone else gets sent back to Level 1 (climbing out of the river).
So, where the fuck is Leo? He’s at Level 4, which seemed to have absolutely nothing of Murphy’s in it. It was just Leo’s old world. So why is Ken Watanabe there? Murphy and the others are gone at this point (back to Level 1), so how the fuck did Watanabe end up in Leo’s world? And it seemed like Watanabe had built his own world, since he’d been living there for so long. So…where had he been? Were they still in Murphy’s head, somewhere? Seems unlikely, I think… And why would going deeper back in level 3 even allow them to save Watanabe? Dying automatically sent him to Level 4? I suppose Level 4 is the limbo they were all talking about…?
Likewise, where was Leo at the end of the film? In his own mind? How…?
There is a basic element of the story I didn’t quite understand, though I don’t think it’s one that can’t be resolved.[/details]
Other thoughts:
*This movie continues my man-crush on Joseph Gordon-Levitt after seeing 500 Days of Summer
*Ellen Page is somehow a 6.5/10 and a 9.5/10 at the same time. I don’t understand it. She is both average and perfect.
*I liked the whole time contrast/manipulation scene that took place during the later third of the film. I thought it was really well done, handling the different storylines, and showing the passage of time is different areas. That part of the film could have easily have been a retarded mess, but it seemed pretty straightforward.
*This was, to me, what The Matrix should have been. I was really disappointed by that movie, because the idea didn’t seem particularly new, and I wasn’t really impressed by it being well-thought-out or anything. This does a much better job.