A dream within a dream
That’s how it all began
Building images upon images
But somewhere something’s got to give

A whirlpool that does nothing but distract
Not even peace is found within sleep
When will this detour come to an end?
These swirling thoughts that occupies my head

So how will this story go?
What’s waiting at the other end?
A new beginning is all I see
Among all the beauty of uncertainty

The swirling whirlpool consumes my thoughts
My river of images long for an escape
A calm and gentle stream lies ahead
Whispers of serenity, you’re the lady of the lake

You come and you go and you never stay long
A tease as always and always as you please
This collage in my head has taken shape
You’re the subject in the clarity of the abstract

Be still, be quiet, my racing mind
Your subconscious calls so gently to mine
You’re a sight that beholds and commands embrace
How can I break from the beauty of your face?

Take my hand and follow my gaze
You’ll see these images as vivid as day
Take a ride in this dream of a dream
You can stay for a while if you like what you see

Stay for a while, maybe two, maybe three
This dream from a dream can be a reality
Let’s build new images, they’ll become our memories
Just take my hand, and you’ll see the beauty of you that I see

(rabbit-of-the-moon.deviantart.com)

So here’s a few more realisations.

In each layer, there has to be a dreamer, to “anchor” the rest of the dreamers. But the subject does not have to be the dreamer. It can be anyone else’s though I’m still unsure how the subject was determined through what process. But it will be the subject’s subconscious that populating the dream. Concluding that, and referring to the previous mentioned article, that the actor Rao has no idea what he’s talking about on the third layer. It was indeed Eames’ dream, but they made it look as if it’s Browning’s just to fool Fischer.

As for the layers, I’ve deduced that there are only four, including the limbo. Reason because when Cobb and Ariadne went to get Fischer (who died and descended into limbo), they “dreamed” their way down instead of dying. So there can only be four layers in order for it to make sense… unless Nolan messed it up himself.

As for how the dreamers could have survived so many attacks without getting injured, I came up with this explanation. When we dream, we don’t die that easily no matter how dangerous the situations get. So same here. Especially when you put the dreamer to control the dream, the dreamer can almost always overcome the adversaries. So this would make perfect sense instead of being another James Bond antics.

But on this second re-watch, there are more flaws as well. Like how Arthur was supposed to only have a few minutes before the “kick”, but there was no way he could have done all the tying up of “loose ends” and re-fixing the explosives and blowing up the safety of the lift in those few minutes. Impossible.

And one of the biggest flaw was how could Saito be so old at the end when he didn’t go down to limbo too early. The age difference between him and Cobb was too huge. Nolan messed this up just to get the dramatic effect.

Even though I understood a lot more after the second viewing, there are still a lot to understand fully. I think I need to watch a third time…

(imdb.com)

An interpretation from my brother, which actually makes sense if the straightforward concept is not mind blowing enough for you. DO NOT read on if you haven’t watched it. But now with some new awareness, I’m going to watch it again. It really was a fun movie.

Here are some simple answers from Dileep Rao (Yusuf in the movie) to get the ball rolling. Source: NYMag.com

When dreaming you can share the dream with others using the drug. But to go deeper, a more powerful sedative is needed – which is where Yusuf came in. If you die in the dream in the first layer, you wake up no problem. But in a deeper layer, the sedative will sink you down all the way to limbo.

First layer was Yusuf’s dream (when it was raining because he had to pee). Second layer, in the hotel, was Arthur’s dream (Joseph Gordon-Levitt). And this is why they were responsible for the “kick” back to reality – using the headphones to warn those in deeper levels – or risk falling into limbo.

Now the third layer, and here’s where it got confusing, should be Eames’ dream (Tom Hardy) while pretending to be Browning (Tom Berenger) to fool Fischer (Cillian Murphy); because Eames was the one responsible for the bomb in order to”kick” the rest back up.

But like Rao said in the interview, Ariadne (Ellen Page) asked whose dream they were going into next in the second layer, and Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) replied Fischer’s, instead of Eames’. So was Cobb trying to fool Ariadne and the audience? Or was he afraid Fischer would hear him? Or did director / writer Christopher Nolan messed this part up?

As for the theory of the limbo, it existed right at the bottom of all the layers and where every dreamer will go to if he (or she) dies when in too deep a dream state. The architecture there is created by the subconscious of anyone who has been there before. In this case, only Cobb has experienced it. And later, Saito (Ken Watanabe) created his “home” there as well.

Now, for the “six layers” interpretation – not just the obvious four layers.

As the old man in Mombassa puts it in Yusuf’s basement: “They come here to be woken up. Their dream has become their reality. Who are you to say otherwise?”

In the movie we see Cobb performing the inception on Mal (Marion Cotillard) because he wanted to keep his wedding promise that they would grow old together. They did. In the dream. But when Cobb brought Mal back, she became flummoxed, lost her mind and her touch with reality. And then killed herself thinking that she was still in a dream.

But how can we be sure whether it was Mal losing her mind or was it actually Cobb? That’s the magic question. If we were to side with Mal, then we have a whole different view of the entire movie.

Each time Mal came into the dream state, she was trying to bring Cobb back into reality. Because when Cobb and Mal lied on the train tracks to commit suicide, they were already in limbo (which Cobb did explain to Ariadne). So, from limbo you only get to wake up to the previous layer of the dream. That’s where Mal committed suicide again from the hotel window. She woke up fully. Cobb did not. Ta dah.

Hence, what we saw entirely was Cobb in his dream. All the other characters existed because Cobb’s subconscious was trying to protect him from Mal, like Fischer’s bodyguards all over the place.

The totem is a clear sign of this. Cobb’s totem belonged to Mal. But we’ve never seen him take it from her in “reality” (or at least not that I can recall, which is one of the reasons I’ll have to watch it again). Cobb found it in limbo, inside Mal’s chest in the house where they lived. So how can that totem be a sign whether or not he’s in a dream or in reality? Furthermore, he never made the totem. One has to make the totem in order to know how it worked. Cobb wouldn’t have.

So the first limbo was the “first layer”. Cobb and Mal woke up from that limbo into the “second layer”. From there, Cobb and his team created the “third”, “fourth” and “fifth layers”. And at the end, the last limbo, “sixth layer” – or back to that “first layer”.

Yes, yes, that was a long essay but I enjoyed the thought process. Time to watch it again.

(twitter.com/JasonReeves)

“Words are such strange sketches of our souls caught still in the moment…” – Jason Reeves on Twitter

(imdb.com)

Worst part of this movie experience was when my friend and I went up to the counter and asked if this was a thriller-horror, the ticket-lady replied no, it was an action-adventure. One minute into the opening, I knew she didn’t know what she was talking about.

If you can sit through the first half, it’ll be worth it; because it wasn’t easy at all. A lot of bull shit went into making the first half and they just didn’t sit well with me.

One of the biggest beef I had with it was how Chloe, Amanda Seyfried, became a storyteller, and a damn good one at vivid descriptions too. It just wasn’t realistic at all, and not good enough for this genre.

The dialogue and script wasn’t bad. Seyfried, Liam Neeson and Julianne Moore were alright. I understand it needed the buildup, but the events unfolded too slowly and many times unrealistically. And then the turning point happened – that split second where everything came together and made the experience worthwhile.

So there is a nice story in there. Just that the execution could have been a bit more realistic in certain aspects.

On a side note, I was pleasantly surprised to see a Nina Dobrev looking cute as ever.

(imdb.com)

It didn’t start off great – funny yes, but not great. Got worse during the middle. But in the end, even though it’s a typical unfolding of events, it worked out for the better.

The three kids were the heart of the movie and stole the whole show in the end. With that first “I love you”, I doubt anyone can feel nothing inside them. That would have moved even a mountain.

Jason Segel was funny as Vector. I enjoyed his voice acting a lot. As well as everyone else for that matter. The story was somewhat original. And for that, there was the enjoyment element. But it’s nowhere near what Toy Story 3 was even with some lovable characters newly introduced here.

I couldn’t tell where the story was going during the middle. It was just slow and tedious at times and didn’t looked promising at all after all the great reviews out there. Things happened too fast but yes it is animation. So certain factors can be overlooked. But because it was great to begin with, so that didn’t help either.

But I’m glad to see the final act was great, with a lot of family values included. But then again, would that be considered a sell-out?

(imdb.com)

What a brilliant concept. Haven’t seen anything this original in a long while. So I think it’s official. Christopher Nolan is a genius and the one to beat at the moment.

The cast was equally brilliant. And I have to say even Marion Cotillard, her eyes when she was looking at Leonardo DiCaprio and Ellen Page when they were going up the lift was scary. Ken Watanabe could have enunciated clearer as at times it was difficult to understand him. But DiCaprio and especially Joseph Gordon-Levitt were a joy to watch. And Ellen Page definitely wasn’t Juno anymore.

The movie and story had a lot of layers, just like the plot. The “thriller” side of things rarely slowed down. Straight from the beginning, like The Dark Knight, Nolan was able to grip the audience and never let go of the intensity. And rarely a movie today is able to do that. Also, because of the layers and complexity in the storyline, Nolan did very fantastic with it.

What I didn’t like, perhaps because I didn’t understand, was how DiCaprio’s team were so adept in fending for themselves and how – like James Bond – bullets were seldom a threat to them. Was it because the projection of the enemies by their owner wasn’t strong enough? Or were our heroes” physical presence in the dreams stronger so they were more in control? I think it was just another James Bond bullshit so I’m shaving one whole point off of my rating.

However, Gordon-Levitt had the best action sequence, with gravity kept changing sides. That was just a brilliant piece of action directing. And I went “wow” a few times.

Another issue I had was with the dialogue. Too much needed to be explained and a lot of it, especially with Ellen Page’s character coming in, were too “explanatory” – making the scene move too fast. Small issue but still.

So many claimed this would be one of the best movies this year. I can certainly see why.

Looking back now it was just a waste of energy. If only we could skip that part about being nervous and just carried on. We could have just believe that we would be great instead. How different would our life be?

It’s true that in life, we are our own worst enemy. We are the ones that are  holding ourselves back from our full potential. We doubt ourselves in times when we should have faith. We kick ourselves when we are down when all we have to do is just get up and continue on. We chain ourselves to the ground when we could spread our wings and soar. We tell ourselves that greatness isn’t in us, when it truly is.

Therefore, without awareness, we would go through life walking on eggshells and never take a chance outside of our comfort zone.

Well, tonight I did. Looking back, it took me something like five years to step into a toastmaster meeting – which was less than two years ago. I used to hate and fear public speaking and never wanted to do it. And last night, I performed on the installation night in front of 140 people. And I was great. Where is the fear now? It was all in my head. False Evidence Appearing Real.

So thank you to the Brunei Speaker’s Club. Your support and friendship has changed my life for the better, forever.