The Key Line in Inception [spoilers, duh]


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Dark Archive Bella Sara Charter Superscriber

Inception is in HBO's rotation these days, and is one of those movies that must be watched when encountered. As such, I've watched various parts of it 2-3 times in the past week or so. The last time I watched it, I noticed a line from Arthur to Ariadne explaining the function of the totems, which boiled down to:

"The totem let's you know if you are in someone else's dream."

Note what the line does not say: The totem does not indicate whether you are in your own dream.

This also explains why it's so important that no one else touch your totem - much like Saito's carpet in the initial sequence, the details of the totem are impossible for a third party dreamer to simulate. This obviously breaks down if the totem is handled by a third party, because that experience would allow them to recreate the totem in the dream world.

Now, granted, Leo later makes the broader statement alluded to above (the totem indicates whether you are in any dream), but, my assertion is that Leo is wrong because he has "forgotten something he once knew," i.e., that the totem only tells you if you are in someone else's dream, not your own. Whether or not Leo's totem stops spinning is irrelevant if he is in his own dream - he knows how long it typically spins before falling, as does his subconcious, and the top actually reinforces the false belief that he is awake rather than exposing the truth.

Mind you, I don't think the above is any type of definitive proof that the entire/most of the movie is in Leo's dreams (Nolin's gone out of his way to say the movie is ambiguous, and to cut it so as to be ambiguous, so anyone who claims to be able to defintively prove it one way or the other is full of shit), but that line reinforced my conclusion that Leo is in a dream during most of the movie.


[bubble bubble bubble]

Woah.


I agree, although I base that on an unconscious collation of clues rather than any sort of lucid deduction. I'd replace "most of the movie" with "all of the movie," though. I think his chickie woke up, and he's still trapped in Limbo.

Dark Archive Bella Sara Charter Superscriber

Kirth Gersen wrote:
I agree, although I base that on an unconscious collation of clues rather than any sort of lucid deduction. I'd replace "most of the movie" with "all of the movie," though. I think his chickie woke up, and he's still trapped in Limbo.

I'm not quite ready to go from most of the movie to all of the movie. But, there are certain scenes set in "reality" that I can't believe are not in a dream, with the chase in Mombasa being the primary example.

I also tend to try and map the characters onto aspects of Leo's personality. For example, the reason Arthur has little imagination is because he is the personification of Leo's reason.

Edit: Also, if we can go down the path of lucid deduction, what leads you to believe that Mal woke up? Any thoughts on why the train didn't wake them both up and why Mal's subsequent death would've woken her up if the train didn't?


Sebastian wrote:
Also, if we can go down the path of lucid deduction, what leads you to believe that Mal woke up?

Maybe because that gives the movie a nice moral -- not to get too self-involved -- instead of it just being a generic action flick? Dunno.

Sebastian wrote:
Any thoughts on why the train didn't wake them both up and why Mal's subsequent death would've woken her up if the train didn't?

They were in too deep for just any dream death to do. Her "suicide" was intentional, with the express intent of waking herself up. I'm foggy on the train (it's been a while since I've seen it), but I don't recall anything about it an that context.


P.S. Hilarious line from 30 Rock: Alec Baldwin is concerned about catching the red-eye flight; he says, "I never sleep on planes. I don't want to be incepted."


Hee hee!


There's one problem though.

The top ISNT Cob's totem. It's Mol's.

What IS Cobb's totem?

I think it's his Wedding Ring. Look at a few scenes when he's in the dream world and he's got it on. Other time's when he's in the "real world" he doesn't. At the end of the movie I'm pretty sure he's not wearing it when he goes out to see his children. Although Nolan does a great job of keeping Cob's hands obscured for most of the ending.

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