Front Row Crew Forum

Why..... why did I not think of that.

Apreche said:

gundabad said:

Why..... why did I not think of that.

I know. I usually think of all these things.

Great movies do this to you. Skilled directors/writers are able to suspect your reality/reasoning and are able to immerse you in a world so convincing that you have to take the time to reflect on the situation for you to discover the "easy way out".

Ok, here's my bs attempt to justify it. He's a fugitive from the law in the US and is subject to extradition. The US know that his children are in the US, if his kids leave to go overseas then the French police will be looking for him at the grandfathers.

....

Yeah, that's a stretch.

gundabad said:

I agree that the greatest writers craft a perfect tale. Inception is a goodexample of what Andrew is saying, though. The #1 reason I didn't consider that plot hole was because I was just enjoying the movie too damn much. If the story didn't have my by the balls, I'd be slightly bored in the theater, and my mind would be racing away poking holes in the film.

Reminds me of my mom. Any movie she watches, even if she's really engrossed, she keeps asking questions and trying to poke holes, even when there are none to poke. The worst is if its one of those movies that leaves things intentionally unexplained only to explain them later. She won't shut up until that explanation appears. Just hope that she accepts the explanation, or it will get even worse.

Apreche said:

gundabad said:

I agree that the greatest writers craft a perfect tale. Inception is a goodexample of what Andrew is saying, though. The #1 reason I didn't consider that plot hole was because I was just enjoying the movie too damn much. If the story didn't have my by the balls, I'd be slightly bored in the theater, and my mind would be racing away poking holes in the film.

Reminds me of my mom. Any movie she watches, even if she's really engrossed, she keeps asking questions and trying to poke holes, even when there are none to poke. The worst is if its one of those movies that leaves things intentionally unexplained only to explain them later. She won't shut up until that explanation appears. Just hope that she accepts the explanation, or it will get even worse.

Oh that is incredibly annoying. I have the common courtesty to keep it as internal thought. My list of acceptable reasons to speak in a theater begins with injury requiring hospital admission (a friend of mine had her appendix burst during Two Towers).

I didn't see this posted yet, and if it was, I apologize...

Regarding the ending (and this is just my interpretation):

The spinning top that Cobb uses is NOT his actual totem. It is his wife's totem. In the beginning of the movie, Cobb tells the girl (Adriane?) that you never show your totem to anyone else, only you are supposed to know what it is. Then throughout the rest of the movie, everyone pretty much knows that Cobb's totem is the top. The Japanese guy is even playing with it in limbo, breaking Cob's rule that even if you know what the totem is, you don't know how it feels, it's weight, etc.

Also, what was Cobb's totem before he took the top out of the safe? What was his totem when his wife was still alive?

One theory that I've read, and that I agree with, is that the faces of Cobb's children are his real totem. Throughout the movie, Cobb keeps wanting to see his children's faces, but avoids doing so, even going out of his way in some instances to avoid seeing them. No one knows what his children's faces look like. Only at the very end of the movie, do we (and Cobb) see their faces.

Based on this, whether the top keeps spinning or falls down doesn't matter. If the faces of Cobb's children are his real totem, then the only time in the entire movie that he sees them, is at the end after the mission is over, and he is back in the real world.

With how important his children are to him, and the whole issue of him and his wife wanting to return to the real world to be with them, it would make sense for his totem to be their faces and not the spinning top.

I could be completely wrong about this, but I really like this explanation.

Thoughts anyone?

Grr said:

Well, I believe his wife came up with the idea of using a totem, which means Cobb didn't necessarily have one before her death. What through me off about the children though was, that they hadn't aged at all.

...and they both sounded older during the phone call earlier in the movie.
...and they were wearing the same clothing when he met with them.
...also a totem had to be something you could hold in your hand.
...I'm on a horse.

I was thinking about what totem could I have, while playing with my glasses, and thought to myself: "Of course my glasses, no one would know the exact prescription needed to make me able to see, if I put on the glasses and they work then I must be on the real world!" But I can't think of any dream I had where I was wearing glasses, In fact I don't think anyone on that movie wore glasses.

Kate Monster said:

I thought of it during the movie, but it is obvious that Mol's parents have custody, and I doubt they would help him out.

Michael Cane is Mol's father.

"The main idea of "Inception": if you run a VM inside a VM inside a VM inside a VM, everything will be very slow."

I've got a question for you all. If Inception is a movie about shared memories, what is a movie?

Ro said:

I really enjoyed Joseph Gordon-Levitt in this movie. I remember watching him in 3rd Rock From the Sun and 10 Things I Hate About You, and always though of him as the scrawny good guy. There were a few scenes in Inception where I would look at him and think that he looks like Heath Ledger and swoon for a bit. I think it's mostly just the jaw line and mouth that reminds me of him.

I had a similar feeling.

Apreche said:

The worst is if its one of those movies that leaves things intentionally unexplained only to explain them later. She won't shut up until that explanation appears. Just hope that she accepts the explanation, or it will get even worse.

Some of my friends will assume that they missed something, not that it will be explained later. Even as much as within 5 min of the movie starting. They get permabanned from my movie going.

As to inception, the main thing I got was that the intention of the movie was to make the viewer doubt whether Cobb was dreaming still. Thus transferring / "inceptioning" the Cobb/Mal dilemma.

Definitely liking the psychotherapy idea. Especially considering that Ellen Page is Ariadne (greek myth time!) and that the concept of regret is repeatedly shoved in your face. Still questioning the name choice of Robert (read Bobby) Fischer, word gambit is used, and chess totem.

Time to look for significance in other names...

gundabad said:

Setup with no payoff.

Yeah, it's a Chekov's gun that is never fired.

Apreche said:

gundabad said:

Setup with no payoff.

Yeah, it's a Chekov's gun that is never fired.

I'm not too knowledgeable about literary techniques, but I'd like to thank this image for my continuing education:

Hey guys, why'd he always feel his wedding ring following a dream? Just saying...The top is a huge fucking MacGuffin, an object that simply represents guilt. His wedding ring might have been the totem the whole time.

Movie is released today. Methinks I will watch this tonight.

I just saw Inception. The spinning top at the end struck me as a red herring, because the whole point of the totem is the secret to it. If someone who knows the secret is dreaming, then their totem would work the same as in reality; it only tells you if it's someone else's dream.
In fact, based on the spinning top alone, you can't distinguish between reality, Cobb's dream, or even Mal's dream, since it's also Mal's totem.

I'm still not entirely sure what to make of that logic, but I'd say the ending being real makes the most sense nonetheless.