The power of "Inception"

Having mentioned with my friends (including my girlfriend) about the powerful messages conveyed by 'Inception' (the latest work of Leonardo DiCaprio) these few days, I think that it is worthwhile for me to record my thoughts in this blog. At least this can be the music that awakens me from a seemingly inescapable Dreamland some point in future, no matter how fallaciously beautiful it is.

After the classical 'Dark Knight', Christopher Nolan has another chance to showcase his talent in sending powerful messages to the audience in 'Inception'. In 'Dark Knight' Nolan explores the definition of Evil to a very great extent, to which Batman ends up a Dark Knight, who understands fully the real meaning of Evil after a tough lesson. Nolan tried to tell us one simple fact: Extreme Evil has no reason for its existence. It simply exists. And that is the most horrible part of Evil itself. So, how about 'Inception'?

Idea. Extracting an idea from someone's subconscious mind in dream can be as simple as crushing a peanut for Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) in the movie. But doing the reverse- implanting an idea in some other's mind is a near-impossible task. It is true, in the sense that stealing someone's dream by discouraging him is easy, but implanting an idea to make him better is a much harder task.

Then here comes the next message. After an idea, no matter how hard it is, is indeed implanted in someone's mind, it can spread easily like virus. Indeed, when a person understands an idea and he believes in it, that is going change his life for sure, regardless of the degree of change. The idea would spread throughout his mind, empowering him to act based on the idea. That is the power of idea.

Another phenomenon brilliantly brought in by Nolan is that, one of the ways to make a person wake up from an artificial dream built by Cobb's specialist team is to make the person fall down suddenly in the dream. I prefer to label it as the 'Sudden Downfall Effect'. That's true in real life as well. There is no other method which is better than a sudden downfall, to awaken somebody from the world of fallacy that he has been living in all the while. A sudden downfall is the greatest enemy to numbness in life. A nightmare in life turns out to be good in this sense. And I think, all of us need that kind of downfall, once in a while.

The most surprising scene comes at the end of the movie, in which Cobb spins the top on the table to see if this is real or another dream. It is still spinning though seemingly about to topple before the screen goes black. I shouted. Then I got the point.

This is just a movie. The whole plot is merely an artificial dream. Brilliant.