Inception

Wow.

This is hugely visually impressive, but as a rule I'm not hugely visually impressed. I don't wonder how it was done or take a vast interest. I go:

"Not seen that before. Nice"

and then wait for it to get properly interesting. Properly interesting for me is a conceptual thing, and this kinda got there.

It reminded me a bit of first seeing The Matrix, and people who loved that will love this. I didn't love The Matrix. I found it interesting, but the bits that I found interesting were the concepts, and they got tangled and complicated and it felt like "never mind, you're on a moving walkway to the next set piece so just wait and then there'll be something cool to look at!" And cool it may well have been, but I respond much the same way as I do to stage magicians - "Yes that looks impressive, but I know it only looks impressive, and don't flatter yourself I'll be concerned with how you did it".

Inception does a better job of the same thing, for me. There are concepts relating not just to dreams but to the subconscious that everyone can relate to behind the premises of the film, and it's interesting the way that one character's psychological trauma impacts on the events of the film.

if there's a problem with it for me it's that i felt that it was too tangled - there's no way on first viewing you can decide whether the movie's following its own rules, which puts you straight on the matrix set piece moving walkway. You start to become seduced by the idea that it's solveable, that because you're thinking hard to keep up with the concepts that a point will come in the film where you get there ahead of the main characters and turn into the Poirot of cinema. If you watch this and start thinking this way, stop it immediately. You will feel robbed. It's a set piece film with the human touch, and a very, very good one. Just don't get caught up figuring it out.