So, without a doubt, Inception is a powerful movie – in concept, in it’s making and it’s presentation. Love the casting, so surprising to see grown up Joseph Gordon-Levitt (playing Arthur – best remembered in 10 Things I Hate About You) and Juno‘s Ellen Page as characters in a film like this, but very intuitive and faithful plays all the same. In fact they added the surprise spice that was a perfect foil to Leonardo’s predictably good performace. Love the concept – it’s fresh and will have people thinking about it for ages to come.Hats off to Christopher Nolan – oh and this would have been a great movie to watch in 3D! Oh and another aside: Cillian Murphy (Fischer) and Marion Cotillard (Mal) are actually sublime and super-looking together – would love to see them in a sensual noir film together.

I did have a few concerns about the minutae of the story – the dream sequences – maybe I need to watch it again to clear those doubts. Any thoughts/ feedback welcome!

1 How did both the characters survive the gun wounds in deep dream sequence, when Leo had pointed out that the chances were very weak of them making it through even Level 3, but they came through from Level 4?

2 How did Leo bring Ken Watanabe back? It’s not easy to find someone lost in Limbo, as he himself had pointed out earlier, especially when he wasn’t physically with him when he got lost in the dream sequence. Also because Leo thought it was practically impossible to locate someone lost in a Level 3, and he managed to find Ken from Level 4/Limbo?

3 Why did Ken age so much and Leo not age at all – I assume Ken’s aging was a part of him spending so much time in Level 4 (where time would have moved super slow), but Leo would also have spent significant time in Level 4 hunting for Ken – and he didn’t seem to have aged at all!

4 How can Mal take Fischer into deeper levels when she isn’t real and not a part of his subconscious?

5 How did people return from Level 4 (Leo n Ken) without someone there to pull them back? Every other level needed someone who stayed back on a previous level.

6 And a minor point: If they’ve chosen an architect, why couldn’t she make things easier instead of hard for them? Level 3 in the snow and seemed like it would hamper them instead of making their life easier. It didn’t seem like it had a point.

Some interesting ideas on other blogs thanks to @manishacharya:

Inception Explained: A Dream-within-a-dream

Reviews, Critics and Trashing the Critics

Other stuff on Inception, thanks to @leodicaprio:

Unscripted interview with Leo and Ellen Page (Ellen seems nervous and ill-at-ease)

http://o.aolcdn.com/videoplayer/AOL_PlayerLoader.swf

The Mind Crime Game

Chris Nolan’s Dream Research

The Cobol Job: Prologue Comic

Inception Trailor