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Comment by adelevie | Hacker News Reader

The best interpretation I've seen is that the entire movie is an allegory about movie-making. The "shared dream" is very analogous to a movie.

Stokes' interpretation doesn't look deep enough. He attempts to figure out what is really happening before, after, or even during the movie. I find more use in interpretations that try and figure out what something means and what the underlying message the writer/director is making (if any).

Stokes focuses too much on plot and not enough on meaning. Reminds me of people who think the Six Sense is awesome (pretty much everyone) because of its amazing plot twist. But that's all it really had--not too much meaning. A movie worth analyzing shouldn't just stand on plot alone. Thankfully Inception has both an awesome plot and some decently profound meaning.

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But where does Cobb's rampant guilt and Fischer's paternal reconciliation fit into this metaphor for filmmaking? And what does it tell us about filmmaking that would make this worthwhile?

I think it's safer to say the concepts of creation and inspiration are common to dream making and filmmaking and leave it at that.

http://chud.com/articles/articles/24477/1/NEVER-WAKE-UP-THE-...

Not that these excerpts really do the analysis justice, but:

>Except that this is exactly what Nolan is arguing against. The film is a metaphor for the way that Nolan as a director works, and what he's ultimately saying is that the catharsis found in a dream is as real as the catharsis found in a movie is as real as the catharsis found in life. Inception is about making movies, and cinema is the shared dream that truly interests the director.

>The whole film being a dream isn't a cop out or a waste of time, but an ultimate expression of the film's themes and meaning. It's all fake. But it's all very, very real. And that's something every single movie lover understands implicitly and completely.

To answer your question more directly, the familial issues in the plot are a vehicle for emotion. These emotions are just as real in a dream as they are in a movie, as they are in real life (to borrow from the analysis' phrasing).

Hmmm I read the analysis and I don't think it's all that meaningful: just like numerous other films Inception has some themes which it explores (regret, guilt, grieving/loss). If the exploration is insightful enough, then the audience can learn from it. Is Mighty Ducks a metaphor for filmmaking because emotions are just as real in a hockey match as they are in a movie, as they are in real life?

The film touches on some ideas like the intoxicating power of the imagination but I think saying the whole film's a metaphor for filmmaking goes a bit far and the evidence is stacked against his analysis.

I dunno. There are enough references to other films, blatant and subtle, that it makes me wonder.

One thing I learned as a film major is that there's a subset of film critics who will believe every good movie (especially one with any theme of "creation") is a metaphor for moviemaking. Infertile couple? It's about the director's struggles with the movie studio. Mad scientist genetically engineers a monster? That's clearly how the director feels about his creations once they're in the public eye. These critics are right sometimes, but I think there's a large element of "When the only tool you have is a hammer…" at work as well.

Likewise, there are moviegoers for which every good movie is a metaphor for the entrepreneur's saga! :)

I thought it was a rather pointless puzzle. I'm lost as to the profound meaning you're alluding to; is it doubting reality, that it may be a dream, etc.? That's a long way short of original, and besides, it was done much better recently by The Matrix. The plot, however, was clearly less than awesome, with much of it seemingly existing to justify special effects and repetitive fight scenes, providing cheap tension. (The same could of course be said of The Matrix.)

The whole concept of Inception, of course, is unremarkable. Ad-men have been putting ideas in people's heads for some time with quite a degree of sophistication, and magicians have been doing similar for far longer; done well, marks are fooled by both without realizing how or when.

Reading the movie as an allegory of movie-making I think is a stretch. There are matching elements, in particular, not changing the world too much or provoking antagonism; but the whole plot theme of father / child guilt is rather out of place, as is the recursive breaking into of fortresses.

The one thing that I liked about the movie was the absence of white and black morality. There's no villain, and the protagonist's aren't good guys either.

+1. I think I did look beyond just the plot (after all, I suggested none of the plot actually happened), but agreed, it adds an extra dimension to consider the message of the film as well as the themes it explores.

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