In this weeks class we continued our discussion about Inception. Firstly we broke into groups of 4 and made a mind map about Inception, writing down anything that came to mind about the film. Such as aspects of the Mise-en-Scene, interesting shots, ideas about the themes or plot, basically anything that came to mind about the film

Here is a (rather poor) photo of our finsished mind map.

As a group we talked about many aspects of the film, pointing out what we liked and disliked it, as well as examining elements of stylistic choice and trying to disern why Nolan may have implemented them. Some things we discussed was the abundance of exposition, and how its internal mythology was all very conviniant for making a blockbuster film, EG “militarised subconscious” allowed for faceless goons to be a threat and give them film action scenes.

After that the next activity was a set of questions, and we had to positon our selves across the room depending on how strongly we agreed or disagreed, with the door to the hallway being Agree 100% and the window being Disagree 100% and everything in between being a sliding scale.

The questions were not easy, and it seemed like no-one was entirely sure of thier answers. This is because they were un-answerable, such as “Is Inception an accurate representation of the human subconscious”, considering no-one really knows what a representation of the human subconcsous looks like (or if its even possible to represent) its entirely a subjective answer. I moderatly disagreed, primarily for the aformentioned reasons of all the conviances that suited the human subconscious for making a Hollywood film, but I didnt fully disagree because honestly: who knows?

There was several more questions, all of equal hardness to answer, including the triumphant return of “Can film think”. The final question however was not about metaphysical representations or film theory, but rather our interpretation of the plot.

Was Kobb dreaming the whole time?

For this question I instantly knew my responce: stand in the dead centre of the room right on the “I dont know” line (a thought shared by almost all the class). This is because the questioning was intentional, and gives the ending its emotional reaction, no definitive conclusion could ever replicate the feelings of questioning and doubt which stay with you after the credits roll and are destined to be discussed and argued about for years to come.