I watched the movie Inception for the first time tonight. Spoilers below the cut.
Inception was complicated. It was emotional. I liked it. I didn’t like it. I wish I’d seen it in theaters.
When I was in high school I saw the first Matrix movie. Inception strongly reminded me of it, but had a lot of extra emotional baggage in regards the main character and his family. The Matrix was simpler and more epic. Inception was personal.
My favorite segment of Inception was the winter ski battle with the white camouflage ski outfits. The scenes reminded me of playing with GI Joes as a kid. It felt like what a GI Joe movie should be. Even though, yes, it was Inception, not a GI Joe movie.
I wanted more background on the architecture student. She says yes to an illegal gig out of the blue and I didn’t quite buy her initial motivations for helping. I also hoped the story would be revealed to be more about her in some way (and not Cobb). But she ended up being a fixture to witness Cobb’s trauma and as a construct to have things explained to. She didn’t feel like a real player in the scenarios.
The ending was right on with what was important to Cobb. I got the point that Cobb was with his kids again and that the reality (to him) didn’t matter. Christopher Nolan later clarified a detail I missed: Cobb leaving behind the spinning top represented him letting go of his deceased wife.