Inception

Warner Bros.

Rating: PG

148 minutes

Inception is a movie that often leaves the viewer feeling lost and confused, but it’s meant to and this reviewer suspects it will get better with a second and third viewing.

Leonardo DiCaprio plays a criminal that steals information or secrets from people’s minds while they are dreaming.

That concept alone is hard for viewers to get their head around. But after a few minutes into this film there are three (I think) levels of reality going on within the context of the movie, involving the same characters, but all running on different time scales. Sort of a dream within a dream within a dream.

A lot of it involves shoot-outs and explosions, more than enough for a regular action thriller, and it is hard to accept that this is all going on in the character’s dreams, but it’s a nice conceit.

Director Christopher Nolan (The Dark Knight) apparently spent 10 years writing this and characters in the movie spend a lot of time trying to explain what’s going on, but it’s hard to take it all in. Perhaps he’s just a little too clever.

Some talented supporting actors like Ellen Page, Ken Watanabe and Joseph Gordon-Levitt don’t have much to do except run around shooting or jumping off buildings.

There are some impressive special effects, which reminds one of The Matrix and 2001: A Space Odyssey and you are never bored, but sometimes not sure what the heck is going on.

Rating: three deer of five

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Alf Cryderman is a Red Deer freelance writer and old movie buff.