Ranking Nolan

2. Inception (2010)

While films like Memento and The Prestige delivered on big concepts, Inception is the movie that truly blended Nolan’s big ideas with equally strong character work. This is what so many filmmakers strive to accomplish, and at times even the greats like Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese struggle to achieve it. Inception is a near perfect film. We’ve all seen it, so we know how complicated and ambitious the plot is. I can’t find one dark corner of the Internet where somebody is nit-picking this movie. The plot holes are non-existent.

When people cite this movie as being great, but cold in terms of emotion and character, I’m just utterly flabbergasted. Amongst all the complex dream within a dream shenanigans, rotating hallways, and crazy synchronized kicks, this is a movie about a man letting go of the guilt he has for killing his wife. I’m completely invested in Cobb’s story, played brilliantly by Leonardo DiCaprio, an actor I pray works with Nolan again. The relationship between Cobb and his wife (Marion Cotillard) is extremely powerful and volatile. You also have the whole Fischer (Cillian Murphy) dynamic with his dad (Pete Postlethwaite), which makes for a dramatic emotionally charged climax. Not only that, but the film is full of charismatic and awesome characters that include Tom Hardy, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and a criminally underrated turn for Ellen Page. Yeah, the dream stuff is awesome and I love it, but it’s the character relationships I remember most from this film. Inception is cold and emotionless? Yeah, I don’t think so.

Oh, and Hans Zimmer’s score is flat out gorgeous.

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