The difficulties of 'Inception'

[twaddington]

We still don't know exactly what Inception is all about. Nolan has been teasing us with crumbs of information ensuring that out anticipation is cranked up to 11. The latest trailer demonstrated some of the mind bending special effects we can expect as we witness an entire city peel back like a banana. In a recent interview with the LA Times, Nolan sprinkled a few more crumbs.

Here Nolan talks about one of the major influences on the film

“I think we’ve put a lot of different things into the pot with this one,” Nolan said this week during a break from the editing bay.
“I grew up watching James Bond films and loving those and watching spy movies with their globetrotting sensibility.... We get to do that here, not just geographically but also in time and dimensions of reality as well. We get to make a movie that’s expansive, I suppose you’d say, in four dimensions.”

Producer and wife of Nolan, Emma Thomas says of Inception

“It’s something that we had been talking about on and off for seven or eight years," Thomas said. "Coming off of the ‘The Dark Knight,’ the only thing we really knew is that we wanted to do something more personal. It seemed like the right time to do this. The fact that it’s really just an enormous movie -- that wasn’t ever really a factor in the decision. This story lends itself to a movie of this size."

And here Nolan says Inception is the biggest thing he's done, yet.

This is the biggest challenge I’ve taken on to this point,” said Nolan, who may return to Gotham City for his next feature. “We’re trying to tell a story on a massive scale, a true blockbuster scale – the biggest I’ve ever been involved with. We tried to make a very large-scale film with ‘The Dark Knight’ and with this one we wanted to push that even further.”

Still excited about the film or do you just wish they'd spill a few more beans?

sources-http://www.latinoreview.com/news/how-crazy-is-inception-according-to-christopher-nolan-it-s-his-biggest-challenge-to-date-8966,
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/herocomplex/2010/01/bigger-than-batman-christopher-nolan-says-inception-is-the-biggest-challenge-ive-taken-on-.html

[Sheridan Passell]

Come on people this movie is just a spy version of The Cell, with people entering people's minds not to find a serial killer but to steal industrial secrets.

I even came up with a new tagline -
Where. Is. J-Lo?
It creates intrigue I'm sure you'll agree.

[dnwilliams]

Come on people this movie is just a spy version of The Cell

you know there are other movies/stories about entering someone's mind right?

[Sheridan Passell]

Nope.

Name 10.

[Sheridan Passell]

Quote From Leo This Week:

“Chris [is] delving into dream psychoanalysis and, at the same time, making a high-octane, surreal film that came from his mind. He wrote the entire thing, and it all made sense to him. It didn’t make sense to many of us when we were doing it. We had to do a lot of detective work (laughing) to figure out what the movie was about.”

"It didn’t make sense to many of us when we were doing it." ...umm.

[dnwilliams]

Nope.

Name 10.

1) Being John Malkovich
2) Being John Malkovich
3) Being John Malkovich
4) Being John Malkovich
5) Paprika
6) Greek Mythology (Morpheus)
7) Sandman
MoonDreamers
9) New X-Men #121
10) Psychonauts

[Sheridan Passell]

A pretty ramshackle list. Now, what do you think of the quote?

[dnwilliams]

Hey, you said name 10, and I did. You didn't say I couldn't ram shackles.

Quote doesn't surprise me. How many of them do you think got the full script?

[Sheridan Passell]

It kinda sounds to me like there was a lot of confusion on set, and not necessarily in a good way. Surely the principle cast and crew had the whole script?

[dalmatianjaws]

For such an expensice, important production I'm sure they all had the full script.

High potential for suck. Lots of risk. But if it pays off, it will be absolute gold.

[dnwilliams]

You're probably right about the script...DiCaprio obviously had all of it.

He BLATANTLY meant that quote to be interpreted as a positive statement about the complexity of the movie though. He doesn't say 'it makes no sense' he says 'we had to figure it out'. If anything, this raises my hopes. You guys losing faith?

[Sheridan Passell]

Nolan's regular crew and some of the smartest actors in the world say it didn't make sense to them when they were doing it. The trailers certainly don't make any sense right now. Honestly it does worry me a bit.

[dnwilliams]

Huh. He does say they figured it out though. It might make me worry about its appeal, but not its quality.

[dalmatianjaws]

What worries me is that when directors are given too much power they often make lower quality, self-indulgent movies (Lucas, Del Toro)

[dnwilliams]

In some cases. I don't see any reason to apply that precedent to Nolan...we know so little about Inception and what we do know is tantalising. I couldn't be more confident about this film.

[Sheridan Passell]

You said that about the Last Airbender and that turned out to be a disaster.

[dnwilliams]

I said I was confident it would have sequels, not confident it will be good. I compared it to Twilight, if you remember. I was seriously disappointed in Airbender the moment casting announcements were made. But the story is solid.

And it hasn't 'turned out' to be anything yet Sheridan, I know what you're trying to do - it's old Jedi mind trick! You know you like the special effects, don't lie to yourself

[Sheridan Passell]

That's not the movie you're looking for.