The plot synopsis from IMDB: In a world where technology exists to enter the human mind through dream invasion, a single idea within one’s mind can be the most dangerous weapon or the most valuable asset.
That grabbed me right away. The trailers for the movie made it look incredibly cool. Because of the trailers I was wary about seeing the movie though. Hollywood always puts the best parts in the trailer, sometimes even giving away the ending. I worried that might be the case here. I was so wrong.
This movie was so good on so many levels. At a basic level the movie is about corporate espionage. Cobb is an expert at invading your dreams and extracting secrets you don’t want to get out. At its heart it’s about family and forgiveness.
The story was great. The writing was incredible. This is one script I want to study just to see how Christopher Nolan did it. The layers were amazing. He was subtle with his setups and hit us right between the eyes with the pay offs. And the end is one of those endings that make you wonder. The question I had at the end of the movie is one I had in my mind the whole time the movie was running. It will make you think. I’ll probably watch the movie a number of times to see if I missed anything. If anything in the movie makes the answer to the ending question obvious. I don’t think there is. But we’ll see.
The shooting script for the movie will be for sale in September. I can’t wait to get my hands on it. I want to read it and just study every page. Now if any of you Hollywood types out there want to send me a copy before then, I wouldn’t say no. 
I heard on the radio this morning that this was DiCaprio’s best opening weekend yet. That’s good news for people who love this kind of movie. Go out and see this movie so Hollywood will keep giving us movies like this. It’s one of those movies I wish I’d written.
Anyone else see it? What did you think? If you’re going to comment, please no spoilers.
I’m off to work to see if anyone there saw Inception over the weekend. I feel the need to discuss without worrying about spoilers.
Until next time…
Cindy
July 19, 2010 at 10:11 pm
This isn’t my sort of favorite movies, plus my sister and bil were visiting. But you make it sound good.
I’ll watch Eat, Pray, Love when I get back from National.
July 20, 2010 at 6:26 am
I agree with you, this is a great film. After seeing it my husband and I spent the whole next morning discussing the possible interpretations of the ending. By our calculations at least two interpretations of the ending are supported. Later when I talked to my daughter about it she came up with a third one that hadn’t even occurred to me.
There is an interview with Christopher Nolan in Creative Screenwriting. And all of his scripts except inception are available on this website, http://www.nolanfans.com/screenplays/
This kind of storytelling is called complex screenwriting. Other examples of it by Nolan are Following, Memento, and The Prestige. Other films with complex structure are The Conformist, Groundhog Day, eXistenZ, 12 Monkeys, almost everything written by Charlie Kaufman (Being John Malkovich and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind stand out), THe Lake House, the 13th Floor, House of Games, Multiplicity, Primer, Vantage Point, Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive (in fact, almost everything by David Lynch). If anyone can add to this list I’d be glad to see it. As you can guess I’m working on a screenplay with similar structure myself.Warren Buckland edited an anthology called Puzzle Films: complex storytelling in Contemporary Cinema published by Wiley-Blackwell in 2009. He includes films like Run Lola Run, Sixth Sense, Internal Affairs, In the Mood for Love, (in fact many of Wong Kar Wai film’s are complex storytelling) The Day the Pig Fell into the Well, Suzhou River, Purple Butterfly. Studying these scripts is very helpful to someone who wants to write similar.
Alison
July 20, 2010 at 3:00 pm
Cool post!
But I will be studying movies more from now on. Not sure if that’s good or bad. But I’m going to think about my faves and see if I can pin point the layers and big “wow” moments.
hummmmm.
July 21, 2010 at 2:03 pm
Edie it was so good.
Alison I’d love to know what your daughter came up with! Thanks for all the information. I didn’t know about his screenplays being on the website. Must go check! I love complicated plots.
Laura, studying movies is always good. They can teach us a lot about story telling.