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Text | Andrey's notes
Editor's Notes | Andrey's Notes
Build dreams and soothe the most vulnerable parts of the soul
Leonardo won the 88th Academy Awards for Best Actor for "The Revenant", and the long road of four Oscar nominations since 1994 finally won the little golden man, which can be described as "a dream home".
In 2010, "Inception" starring Leonardo showed his skillful and irreplaceable acting skills, and on the other hand, it also highlighted director Nolan's ability to control the narrative structure of the film.
It can also be intended that "Inception" is the true confession that the dream stealer finally realizes what he wants and soothes the most vulnerable part of the subconscious, and the film's movie plot and narrative mood are relaxed, and the dream stealer Cobb who is walking in the dream building process is vividly reflected in the helplessness, anxiety and fear between dream and reality, real and unreal, and also implies that a home with family affection is the best harbor to comfort the fragile place of the soul, so the dream building journey of the dream stealer is to open a door home for people in the most vulnerable place of the subconscious.
Inception storyline: Cobb the Dream Stealer is a high-tech burglar who profits from stealing valuable trade secrets through people's unconscious activities in dreams.
He believed that the subconscious mind can be manipulated, the energy of the subconscious is immeasurable, and that people can play an almost omniscient and all-powerful role in dreams, so Cobb and his wife Mel are obsessed with the exploration of people's subconscious energy.
In the process of exploration, Mel gradually gets lost between reality and dreams, hoping to stay with Cobb forever in the love nest they built together on the edge of chaos in dreams, for which Mel jumps off the building to commit suicide and leaves a suicide note of Cobb's murder of his wife.
Cobb, who was identified as the murderer of his wife, could only leave a pair of children behind and go overseas to begin his journey. Cobb loses during a dream raid against business magnate Jaziten, but is hired by Saito, and Zitten's political forces are able to drop the charges against Cobb.
In order to reunite with his family in reality, Cobb decided to complete the task assigned by Zitten, and implanted the idea of "dissolving the family business" into Fisher, the new heir of Zito's rival.
This is a dream that changes Fisher's cognition, which is full of dangers, on the one hand, Cobb has to deal with the instinctive resistance from Fisher, but also to respond to the destruction from his subconscious wife Mel, with the help of dream builder Aliridney, Cobb completed the implantation of Fisher's idea of dissolving the family.
Eventually Cobb returns to his home, and when Cobb picks up his children, the spinning top that proves himself in reality or dream is still turning.
In dreams, people are often lost in the weakest part of their subconscious, and dreamers can steal the secrets buried in the hearts of others. In the same way, in reality, people do not want to touch or unreachable dream builders can be realized for it, Cobb is using the method of dream building to find a way home to find a way home, this is the case in dreams, and the reality is also the same, in order to comfort his subconscious desire for home and helplessness.
Therefore, the construction of dreams in the film is a comfort to the most vulnerable places in people's hearts.
The non-linear narrative ignores the tension of time and space to enrich dreams
"Inception" about the design of dreams within dreams, director Nolan is not the first person, "Red Hot Chili Peppers", "Total Memory" and many other films have involved the concept of dreams within dreams.
But Nolan built the narrative structure of dreams in dreams so ingeniously and precisely, using a "loop-type sleeve structure" to design each layer of dreams, allowing Cobb to shuttle through six layers of composite space, including the real world and five layers of dreams.
Guide the audience to constantly experience the pleasure of thinking brought by dreams in dreams in logical reasoning. If it is studied as an artistic text, then director Nolan's narrative skills are vividly played out in the film.
"The loop-type layer-type structure is based on a multi-layer narrative chain as the narrative power, dominated by the looping back and forth in the direction of time, the plot process is diluted, and the narrative method is highlighted."
This narrative structure is a non-linear structure, breaking the meaning of time and space, and the time clues are subjectively mobilized, which requires the audience to objectively think about and build the narrative mood conveyed by the film with rational thinking in the process of watching the film, and finally interpret the meaning conveyed by the film.
The design of the five-layer dream in the film is to apply the narrative logic of the "loop-type layer structure", and the sign that makes this logic seem reasonable is the temporal relationship between reality and dreams, and between dreams and dreams.
The time here is not synchronized, 10 seconds of the real world can be nearly 3 minutes in the first layer of dreams, more than 1 hour in the second layer of dreams, and more than 1 day in the third layer of dreams, which can be described as a day of reality and decades in dreams. It is precisely with a plausible logic of time that the story between the layers of dreams can unfold reasonably.
The first space-time in the film is the space-time of the real world shown in the film, and here is also the space-time of the real environment recognized by the audience's consciousness, which is the origin of the dream and the starting point for the dream within the dream to unfold.
In this time and space, the reason why Cobb took Fisher into a dream was explained in order to revoke the accusation of killing his wife and be reunited with his family, and accepted the task requested by Qitten with the helplessness and helplessness of reality.
The second time and space is the first layer of dreams, which is the dream of the apothecary Yusuf, in this layer of dreams, it is resisted by the instinctive consciousness from Fisher and Cobb's subconscious restless factor Mel, causing him to attack the intruder who enters the dream, and the train that appears on the road and the attack from the trained military armed forces makes the first layer of dreams dangerous.
Yusuf drives a van to avoid the attack of the armed men in the heavy rain, and in order to prevent the shot Qiteng from wandering on the edge of the chaos of the dream, Cobb needs to complete the idea of dissolving the company for Fisher as soon as possible, thus starting Arthur's second dream.
This unfolds the story line of Time and Space III, where Cobb, the dream robber in the hotel, cleverly gains Fisher's trust and tells him that he is in a dream. The defenders in the previous layer of dreams have been chasing the "Inception Team", resulting in the host of the dream (that is, the dreamer) being unable to dream quietly, and the dream is extremely unstable under the influence of the host, the weather deteriorates, and the gravity is unbalanced.
In order to complete the task as soon as possible, Cobb persuades Fisher to enter the next level of dreams together, and plans to implant the idea of dissolving the company for Fisher in this dream.
The fourth layer of time and space is the third layer of dreams, and the "Inception Team" assists Fisher in entering the hospital in the snowy mountains to find the last will left by Fisher's father, which is also Fisher's subconscious call for his father's love.
When the father at the time of his death uses his last strength to say: "I'm disappointed that you want to be another me...", when Fisher sees that in addition to his will, there is his childhood windmill in his father's bedside safe, the gap between father and son instantly disintegrates, and the implantation task of the dream team is completed. Time and Space Five is Cobb's dream.
This layer of dreams is not within the design of the dream builder Ariridney, because Mel, who is wandering in Cobb's subconscious in the upper dream, appears and kills Fisher, causing Fisher to enter the deepest dream, the "edge of chaos".
In order to complete the mission to rescue Fisher, Cobb and Ariredne decide to enter the next level of dreams, the fourth dream, to find Fisher and resurrect him in the third dream.
The fourth layer of dreams is Cobb's subconscious space, which is where Cobb and his wife Mel build the love nest together, and it is also the most vulnerable place in Cobb's subconscious, in order to reunite with his children in reality, Cobb must face Mel and face his guilt for Mel in his subconscious.
After Ariredne rescues Fisher, Cobb stays to find Ziteng, who can help him truly reunite as a family in the real world.
The sixth space-time appears in the gorgeous restaurant, and when Cobb meets Qiteng, who is walking on the edge of chaos, time is weakened, life and death are blurred, and the process and result of whether to travel through time and space with Qiteng are hidden...
With the moment the car fell into the water, the moment Arthur blew up the elevator, and the moment the snow hospital was blasted, everyone returned to reality and returned to the first space. On the plane, everyone looks at each other speechless but has a common heart, Cobb's father takes Cobb home to reunite with his children, in order to determine whether this is a dream or reality, Cobb turns the symbolic spinning top, but the spinning top keeps spinning and the film stops abruptly.
According to logical reasoning, if the top does not stop, then the film has a fifth layer of dreams, which also structures the seventh space; If the top falls, it is a pity that the film director Nolan, who constructed such a large and ingenious loop-type layered narrative structure, did not finally jump out of the happy Hollywood ending.
The loop-type layered narrative structure finally brilliantly completes the narrative of dreams within dreams, and achieves the tension of time and space to the extreme, which not only enriches the narrative structure, but also smooths the logical relationship of story development.
The stacked structure brings out the illusion of dreams and the pleasure of thinking
From the perspective of narratology, the dream within a dream of "Inception" is analyzed, and the loop-type set narrative structure is applied, and from another perspective, objectively measured from the computer field, the narrative structure of dream within a dream is similar to the stack structure.
The film has been conveying to the audience the psychological hint of "going home" to find "family affection", that is, the best way to calm the fragile heart is to go home to find the love of family affection.
The ultimate goal of the dream within a dream seems to be to complete the idea of dissolving the company arranged by Ziten, and as the story develops, the final appearance in front of the audience is actually Fisher looking for the lost father's love, and Cobb looking for the way home.
This road home has always been hidden in the narrative structure of the film, with ups and downs, from the beginning of the film to the end of the film, Cobb's homecoming. Cobb finally achieves his ultimate dream building goal, whether it is in reality or in the fifth dream, the most vulnerable part of Cobb's subconscious is finally comforted.
Cobb's search for the road home is long and bumpy, and the film makes two parts of the foreshadowing in rendering Cobb's homecoming, one is the causal "failed mission to steal the dream of Ziteng", and the other is the juxtaposition of "the task of helping Fisher find his father's love and implant the idea of dissolving the company".
As a result, the narrative structure of the film can be split into three different but closely related dream-building roads.
The first is Ziteng's way home, which is the beginning of the film, Cobb is hired to steal Ziteng's trade secrets, and takes Ziteng back to his lover's house in a dream to torture him, due to the negligence of the host of the dream in the dream team, the quality of the carpet of Zitten's family, which causes Ziteng to debunk Cobb's plan, and the mission fails.
The second way home was paved for Fisher, in the dream Cobb took Fisher to his father's hospital, satisfying Fisher's long-standing father's love and his father's desire for support for his life and career development, so that Fisher found his family and had a real meaning of home.
The third way home is Cobb's way home, and Cobb's return has two ways, one is the ideal home he and his wife built in their dreams, on the edge of the chaos of dreams, his wife longs for the home he can return, and the other is the real home that Cobb longs to return to, the reunion of his father and two children.
The three paths home are arranged in a stacked structure that is both ups and downs and cleverly reasonable, which is why Nolan masters the narrative structure.
The three paths home have a reasonable causal relationship, and logically juxtapose and intersperse, and Cobb, who runs through the three paths home, has been symbolized, and will he finally return to the real home or stay on the edge of chaos that is not strictly part of the fifth level of dreams?
The open ending leaves the audience's infinite imagination and mobilizes the audience's thinking pleasure.