Inception

Inception is a rare breed of movie. Firstly, it came out in July and thus can classify as a summer blockbuster, and secondly, it does not insult the intelligence of the audience and actually takes a few brain cells to keep up with it. It's incredibly well-acted, it has an original story in a time when they are becoming harder and harder to come by, and it's a movie that will definitely be apperciated come awards time. It will probably win more awards for its technical accomplishments, and that is definitely well-deserved, but the acting deserves some praise too because this is probably one of the most well-acted movies of the year.

First I'll talk about the acting. I adore the cast of this movie and every single performance in it was great. However, the only person that has a serious shot of being nominated is Leo and with actors like Colin Firth and James Franco in his category he doesn't have a shot at winning. The rest of the Inception team performed well too, especially Marion Cotillard (who kind of serves as our antagonist) and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. I loved Joseph Gordon-Levittin this movie, but unfortunately he's probably not going to get much love from the Academy. Ellen Page, Tom Hardy, and all the rest of the actors were wonderful as well and deserve praise even though they are probably not going to get much of it.

A lot of movies tend to ruin their good stories and great elements by adding in romance to please mainstream moviegoers. Thankfully, Inception is not one of those movies. The closest thing we get to romance in the movie is Leo's relationship with his dead wife and that one meaningless kiss between Gordon-Levitt and Page that drove all the teenage girls in the theatre crazy (granted, there was a big group of them in the theatre but they didn't prevent me from enjoying the movie). Nothing much else to say about the lack of romance, so I'll move on.

This is my second viewing of Inception and upon seeing it for a second time, some elements of the plot made more sense. For instance, I didn't understand limbo becoming your reality until I saw it for a second time, and I just picked up on tons more things that I didn't pick up when I saw this in the theatre. Another thing one should know about this movie is that you have to give it your full undivided attention or you run the risk of falling behind. I'm not going to explain the plot so as not to give away any spoilers, but some may find it hard to follow, so I direct you back to my first comment about undivided attention.

Okay, so next I'll say the obvious. The visuals and general technical work are stunning and deserve to be praised and awarded, especially by the academy. The matrix effects have now been perfected and Inception is fine proof that visuals don't have to trump story or character development. I can guarantee that Inception will get nominated for technical awards, although probably not for the acting even though it deserves it. I don't really have anything to say so I'll wrap this up.

Inception truly is a wonderful movie, one of my all time favourites. TIt has an intelligent original story, creative characterization, awesome special effects, and it was my personal favourite movie of 2010. All of that is sure to pay off come awards time and rightfully so. If you haven't seen this movie, I will tell you that it is a great one worthy of multiple viewings and deserves to be on my favourites of all time list. Probably one of the best films I've seen in a while.