Inception:Who knew that dreams could be so literal?

Dreams are a fantastical place. Within our dreams, we can create complete universes. I've had dreams where I just go from location to location, with no care as to how I got there. I have conversations that make little to no sense. There are no beginnings or endings. Sometimes they're scary, sometimes they're fun and hauntingly wonderful. Laws of physics have no meaning within there. But the most amazing thing at all is that, while we're dreaming, they appear to make complete and perfect sense. As Leonardo DiCaprio comments in Christopher Nolan's epic movie Inception, "It's only when we wake up that we realize how wierd it was."

When I first heard that Christopher Nolan, following up on his masterpiece The Dark Knight with a $200 million tale about dream thieves, I was eagerly looking forward. This is a man who took a simple revenge tale and turned it upside down (Memento) and then followed it with Robin Williams' creapiest performance paired off with a reminder of why Al Pacino is so respected (Insomnia). Finally he redefined what a superhero movie can be by digging deep into the psyche of man who is obsessed with his role in life (Batman Begins) and an examination of how terrifying true chaos can be (The Dark Knight). With that resume behind him, I had nothing less than the highest expectations and, with an incredible trailer that showed a lot yet revealed very little, I was expecting to be blown away.

And, at times, I was. The tale is mesmerizing at times. Nolan, cleverly, uses the artifice of a standard heist drama to stage some jaw dropping sequences. Leonardo DiCaprio plays Cobb, an "extractor" who has made a profitable living out of invading people's dreams and stealing secrets that they have buried deep inside. He is hired now to do the opposite task -- an inception -- where he plants an idea inside a person's subconcious. He has to go many levels deep because he has to convince the person that it's their idea or else it will be rejected.

Nolan spends the first half of the film laying the groundwork and explaining the rules of the dreamworld. This is necessary because this is a very complex setup. It also allows us to meet the members of DiCaprio's team -- Arthur (Joseph Gordon Levitt) who is Cobb's right-hand man, Eames (Tom Hardy) whose job is to impersonate people within the dream and Ariadne (Ellen Page) whose purpose is to construct the world of the dream. Because she is the new member of the team, she also acts as the audience's surrogate allowing the other character's to explain all of the rules and setup of dreams.

I won't go any further into the plot because it is best to experience it fresh and with as little foreknowledge as possible. But, unlike Knight and Day which revealed all of their best scenes in the trailer, Inception's trailer only gave you a taste of it's magnificence. The scene with the city folding onto itself? It's even better and grander in it's complete version. People fighting while floating in the hallway? Even more jaw dropping in the film. And the trailer gave no hint as to how complex the last half gets with dreams within dreams within dreams, all occurring simultaneously but at different speeds. The fact that Nolan managed to keep all of those balls in the air proves how masterful of a filmmaker he is.

But that's not to say there aren't disappointments in the film. In the first half, Nolan examines ideas such as creating complex mazes and reality on the fly that are never fully explored in the second half. And, also, with the exception of the hallway fight sequence, he never completely takes advantage of how fantastical dreams can get. One can only imagine what someone like Michel Gondry or David Lynch would have done with similar material.

But, that's not to say that I didn't love this movie. I was completely swept up into it and that is takes to Nolan and the cast. All of the cast members were smartly chosen for their roles. DiCaprio is proving more and more that he is one of the best actors of his generation. While Levitt and Page aren't really given much to do in terms of range, they make the most of it and you like their characters because of them. Also, Michael Caine (as Cobb's father) is now at the point of his career that all he has to do is show up and you admire whatever he has to say. It's a cameo performance but anytime spent with him is always enjoyable. I would talk about Marion Cotillard (as Cobb's wife, Mal) but to describe why I admired her performance would involve me having to talk more about the plot than I care to.

Is this the classic mind-bending tale that I hoped it would be? It falls a few steps short. Is it epic and engrossing? Most definately. Is Christopher Nolan now one of the best commercial story tellers working today? By a long shot.

So, how many days is until Batman 3 opens????????

Grade: A

Knight and Day: Who needs a plot when you have Tom Cruise?

After I left the theater seeing Knight and Day, I suddenly remembered one of the reasons I'm grateful I'm not a celebrity. Sure, they get paid millions of dollars, travel the world, live in gorgeous homes and hang out with beautiful women. But there is a price for that luxury. Every mistake you make, every stupid move you do, follows you around for the rest of your career and you get branded with the same vehemence by the public as if you slaughtered a group of orphans.

Tom Cruise is a perfect example. This is a man who is, for the most part a talented actor. He has played opposite some of cinema's best (Robert Duvall, Paul Newman, Meryl Streep, Jack Nicholson) and has held his own. He knows how to carry a film and make his characters likeable (Risky Business, Born on the Fourth of July, A Few Good Men) or unlikeable (Tropic Thunder, Collateral) as needed. But what has been the crime that has made the public turn against him? Jumping up and down on a couch on Oprah and arguing with Matt Lauer on The Today Show. It makes me grateful that my career isn't judged by rants I've gone on or idiotic behavior I may have done or else I would be looking for the nearest refrigerator box to live in.

Those thoughts occurred to me after the movie because Cruise is easily the best thing about the otherwise completely disposable Knight and Day. In the movie (which makes less and less sense the more I thought about it), he plays a former secret agent who runs into Cameron Diaz at an airport. After a flight where he literally kills everyone other than Diaz (who somehow doesn't think it's strange that only about 1/2 dozen are on a flight that she was almost bumped from because it was "full"), he forces Diaz to go on the run with him as they cross numerous contenents while in the possession of a battery that never runs out of juice (which is shoved into a toy knight, hence one half of the title).

The plot never makes any lick of sense and has the least convincing ending of any film I have ever seen. After seeing the movie, a friend of mine asked me "Those people who were pursuing Cruise at the end -- were they good or bad guys?" It says a lot where, after thinking about it, I honestly had no idea. It's one thing to be confused by a David Lynch movie (I basically expect to be sitting there having no clue why there's a backwards talking dwarf on the screen) but with a summer action blockbuster, the plot should be a tad clearer and easier than follow than a governmental housing code (and more interesting too).

That's not to say that the movie didn't have possibilities. Cruise, as I mentioned at the beginning is quite good. He plays the character as an agent who is so bored by the proceedings that he has time to be completely polite to everyone (including a fireman whom he has just shot in the leg). That dichotomy to the insane proceedings does provide for more than a few laughs. Unfortunately, most of the film's best jokes are in the trailer so there's no major reason to go see the movie.

In the end, the movie is completely forgettable and another sign that this is definately not the best of summers. But, unlike others, I don't lay the blame for this at Cruise's feet. The man tried. Hopefully, next time he'll be given a project that will make us forgive him for the infamous crime of being excited while on a talk show and for stating an opinion he strongly believes in. Those are harsh acts to overcome but someday he will find a way to repent for the crime of being human.

Grade: C-