The reviews I’ve seen for Inception, the new film starring Leonardo DiCaprio, have in most part been full of raves.  And don’t get me wrong; I did enjoy the film.  It just wasn’t nearly as exceptional as I had hoped it would be.  Christopher Nolan (who wrote and directed one of my all-time favorites, Memento) has long since moved into the world of big budget blockbusters (Batman Begins and The Dark Knight being recent examples), and Inception seems to be his attempt to blend that with the twisted originality of Memento. 

The plot is rather simple on the surface, a sort of Mission Impossible crossed with The Matrix crossed with Dreamscape.  DiCaprio plays Cobb, who with his partner Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) freelance the ability to enter a target’s dreams, in an attempt to steal secrets.  As you would expect, part of the mystery of the film is figuring out when someone is dreaming, or even experiencing a dream within a dream.  For reasons unclear at first, Cobb is unable to return home to the United States.  So when he is offered an “impossible” job of planting an idea in a target’s subconscious in exchange for making a return home possible, he agrees. 

Commence the Mission Impossible link.  He assembles his team, including a “forger” (someone skilled at assuming different identities within a dream), an “architect” (who builds the world of the dream, played by Ellen Page), a chemist (to build the necessary sedative to allow a dream within a dream within a dream)…and off we go.

I don’t want to go any deeper into the plot and spoil things for those who will see Inception, but the logic of the “rules” of entering other people’s dreams hold together rather well.  I liken that to the consistent but complicated world of Dr. Who.  It might sound complicated, but it makes sense.  However, there were a few instances where I was bothered by breaks in that chain of logic…where Nolan doesn’t tie it together properly.  And the plot twists were not very surprising.  As Heather said, “When *I* figure it out before it happens, you know it’s obvious.”

The other significant problem with the film is, in my opinion, the casting of DiCaprio.  The emotion he shows on screen never feels real; and the character is all too familiar territory for him.  Again, Heather came up with the perfect line as she whispered to me “Does he do any movies anymore where he isn’t a tortured soul?”

This review sounds negative, but I know it really shouldn’t be.  It was difficult to make out some of the dialogue, which I attribute to the theatre…if it’s the movie itself, that would be another problem.  But still, Inception is fun, interesting, has a lot of action, and a good summer popcorn movie (a bit long though compared to others, nearly 2 ½ hours).  So go see it, and have a good time.  I just hoped I’d walk out feeling blown away…and I didn’t.  As a matter of fact, I enjoyed Winter’s Bone in total more than Inception.  It wasn’t fun, but it held my attention better. 

And just in case you enjoy that kind of thing, Inception can also be seen in IMAX theatres.  The visuals are often quite striking, so I would bet the IMAX version brings that to a whole new level.