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Inception is one of those films worth your money to see on the big screen. The filming and special effects were exhilarating, together with an equally mind-bending plot. Rather than analyze the technicalities of the film, summarise its plot, or unveil a series of spoilers, however, I intend to highlight a few of the main themes in the film and explore how we might address these themes as Christians.
Inception is all about dreams. In fact, the film is about entering into dreams in order to carry out heists, either extracting secrets or planting secrets or ideas: an inception. The film presents dreams as the realm of memories and the subconscious, a place where you can experience the past and be motivated to do something in future. And of course, a major premise of Inception is that these dreams can be entered, their architecture can be altered, and their impact can be influenced. This film has already incited a lot of conversation about dreams, but are we as Christians ready to engage in these conversations? The Bible witnesses to God speaking through dreams, people interpreting dreams, and the course of events changing because of dreams. But does this still happen today? Inception focuses on people entering dreams and planting ideas there, but what about God, or even the Devil? If this does happen, should we be seeking to remember and interpret dreams more actively? I cannot attempt to answer these questions now, but I think this is an issue Christians need to be talking about, and feel free to start a discussion in the comments.
The issues raised in Inception are immense, and Christopher Nolan accomplished an impressive cinematic feat to capture all of this on film. Many reviews have pointed out its strengths and weaknesses in terms of acting, directing, and producing, which would take another post to address, but I hope this short reflection has shown how Inception gives food for thought that Christians should take time to digest.
Yes, there is definitely a theme of being haunted and crippled by memories. Being transformed as a Christian is a matter of finding healing from some memories and cultivating others. The best book on this subject is one by Miroslav Volf called The End of Memory.
Christopher Nolan stated that he wanted Inception to reflect the idea that dreams seem real for as long as they are happening. Reality, or the veneer of reality, is a key aspect to Inception, one that informs not only the scenes where the characters inhabit the external world but also the ones where the characters are dreaming. In order for a constructed dream to be effective, it must essentially pose as reality, which is why Nash's subtle mistake in reconstructing Saito's carpeting compromises the mission in the film's opening sequence. Nolan constantly blurs the distinction between reality and dreaming: the film opens in a dream-within-a-dream that the viewer could easily mistake for reality, and Mal kills herself because she thinks reality is yet another dream.
Inception is a film that revolves around the use of military-grade technology in a rivalry between two multinational corporations, led by Saito and Robert Fischer. Although in the external world this rivalry takes the form of corporate espionage, in the dream-world this hostility often degenerates into outright violence and warfare. According to the science-fiction premise of the film, in which "dream-sharing" technology has rendered thoughts vulnerable to theft, high-value targets like Saito and Fischer must militarize their subconscious against unwanted threats. Nolan uses the theme of warfare to show how the mind naturally protects itself against manipulation and coercion, such as when the projections in Fischer's dream launch a coordinated ambush to ward off Cobb's team's infiltration attempt.
Cobb can no longer build dreams because he still harbors guilt over the circumstances of his wife's death, and is thus haunted by the projection of her memory. Although Cobb initially tells Ariadne she should never use memories to build dreams, Ariadne later discovers Cobb sharing intimate moments with his memories of his wife (for example, in their anniversary suite) in the recesses of his mind. In Inception, memory is a theme that reflects how unresolved attachments one has to the past can linger in the subconscious, foreclosing the possibility of true happiness. Mal, in particular, is a character that embodies Cobb's toxic and self-destructive tendency to live in a theater of memory where she is still alive. Ariadne eventually pushes Cobb to detach himself from the memory of Mal.
In Inception, the creation of dream worlds requires a skilled architect, who can painstakingly craft the surfaces and structures of the world itself. In dreams, fluid, shifting, and paradoxical architectural forms are all possible, such as the Penrose staircase that Arthur shows to Ariadne. Nolan uses architectural complexity as a way to reflect the complexity of the human mind. For example, Cobb first orders Ariadne to draw pen-and-paper mazes before showing her how to construct dream-worlds, as a way to introduce her to the labyrinthine environments that the team will need in order to avoid projections. The surreal architecture of dream-spaces, like the hidden operating room behind the control panel of Fischer's fortress, or Cobb's subterranean hotel suite, model the different "levels" of the mind, and the way the mind represses certain forms of knowledge.
Cobb's feelings of guilt over the circumstances of his wife's death provide the emotional center of the film. Specifically, Cobb feels guilty for performing inception on his wife Mal, so that she would agree to wake up from the fifty-year dream they shared together and be with their children again. Cobb's unresolved guilt in the external world leaves him vulnerable to attack in his dreams, which Mal's projection is prone to invading. The film's use of Edith Piaf's song "Ne, Je Ne Regrette Rien," ("No, I Regret Nothing") is also a reference to the theme of guilt, sung from the perspective of a woman who has decided to relinquish her attachment to the past. Like the voice of Piaf's song, Cobb eventually learns to detach himself from his feelings of guilt and regret over Mal's death.
This is a subtle thing I noticed but Mal is French and her name translates to "bad". I was looking at the Hans Zimmer's score and the title theme is a modification of a French song from 1960 by the name of "Non, je ne regrette rien" which roughly translates to "I will live no longer with regret". I went and looked into the lyrics/meaning of the song and was surprised to find an apt metaphor for the movie. It is a song about moving on from a lost love. It also addresses "mal", through the singer's perception of good and bad as only relative. The bulk of the song is about ridding oneself of the haunting memories of that lost love. I think Hans Zimmer deliberately chose this song not only for its tune, but for its metaphorical content. The track is played unchanged in reality scenes and slowed down in dream scenes, thus representing the (seemingly) dualistic nature of his relationship with Mal. In the end, I believe he finally achieves self-Inception, such that he is able to successfully psychologically integrate both the "good" and "evil" aspects of Mal (and himself) and his relationship with her, relieving him of his guilt. The process does not neccessitate the ending of the film to be in either dream or reality, the point of cutting away from the wobbling top is that the nature of being is subjective, and ultimately it did not matter whether the top falls or not, but that through the journey he finds a kind of catharsis. Here are the lyrics to "Non, je ne regrette rien", and further analysis of the ending.
So the ending of the song may actually be a subtle breaking of the fourth wall, directly addressing the viewer who, in order to achieve a sense of resolution, is compelled to fabricate a reality external to that of the film which is cogruent with their expectation. The impulse of the viewer to subconsciously not only engage in the fiction but, frustrated by a lack of resolution caused by the "loss" of the ending scene, is to then actually fabricate one's own contribution to the narrative; analagous to the way in which Cobb seeks resolution of loss through subconscious fabrication. The repercussions of the viewer's impulse are negligible, relative to the fiction. The tasks and events of the movie are as supremely complex and difficult as the gravity of Mal's death. The leap to her demise, fatal or not, pulls her so far from his expectation, upon which his subjective reality is built, that in order for achievement of congruent resolution, it required the confabulation be embued with sufficient force as to overcome the tremendous inertial dissonance and angst created by existential attachment.
I have more essays and thoughts about Inception from various philosophical and psychological approaches if anyone is interested in more rigorous discussion of the film, I would be interested in starting up dialogue. You can reach me at daveb...@gmail.com
Inception feels like Nolan concluding the themes of these films in perhaps the most personal way possible. I watch the film at least once a year, and on more recent viewings, it has become more and more obvious that beyond the effects work and intricate plotting, the film is actually telling a very human and very small story that hits home no matter what level of reality you are on. It is perhaps a clue as to how personal Inception really is that the lead character Cobb played by Leonardo DiCaprio actually dresses and looks identical to Nolan himself based on the pictures we have seen of the director. Thanks to the mystery the director is shrouded in, we may never know if Nolan has some kind of guilt complex around someone he once lost in his life, but Inception may well be a big clue.
Blame and responsibility aside, why Inception has become a beautiful film to me way beyond the aesthetics, the performances, and the writing, is the weight it carries in the real world. If you have ever loved or cared deeply for someone who has mental health issues, then I feel like Inception will strike a chord with you that it might not for others. It is often very difficult to love someone with all their flaws and all of their issues as well, but if you do love them, then you love them all, every part of them, and sometimes the flaws are why you love them, and why it becomes more difficult to let go. Losing someone close to you with mental health issues actually changes you as a person. The death of anyone close to you will change you, but when someone goes and they had issues, then it becomes something else. You ask yourself constantly, did I do enough? Did I love them as much as I could have? Did they know how much I cared before the end? These questions never really go away, but they get easier with time until eventually, the dreams stop, and the memories are just lessons you learned upon the journey.
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