Inception

Three weeks and almost $200 million domestic ticket sales later, “Inception” is still reverberating in the minds of millions. I, for one, saw the midnight IMAX showing and then saw it again the next day (yeah I geeked out, I work here, what did you expect?).

I’m not going to get into the nitty gritty of all the details of the movie or offer my own theories about certain images and characters. I just wanted to note the obsessive way we as a culture have received the movie. Tons have been written about it all over the internet. A good place to start is A.O. Scott’s article on the reviews of the movie.

But in Scott’s own review he asserts that “Inception” is “something to be mused over rather than analyzed, something you may forget as soon as it’s over.” This couldn’t be further from the truth. If this movie has done anything, it has ignited tons of analysis, argument, debate, and dialogue.

So when Scott writes “If I had to issue a one-sentence manifesto for film criticism, it would be this: Any movie worth seeing is worth arguing about, and any movie worth arguing about is worth seeing” he’s contradicting himself. I understand that in the first quote he is referring to the general public and in the second he is referring to film criticism. But what he doesn’t take into consideration is that we’re all critics, especially now in the 21st century when anyone can publish his or her opinion on the internet and be read by others.

“Inception” is not a movie that people have merely mused over or forgotten. It has inspired people to analyze, argue, and critique; therefore it is worth seeing for everybody, not just film critics. That’s what I think is so great about this movie. More than the story or the characters or the visual effects, it’s the fact that it has spurred enormous debate. New discoveries (have you seen this?) and interpretations (or this?) come out all the time. It forces you to think and have conversations. The greatest art always does.