Wednesday, September 23, 2015

Inception and Modernism

            This week in class we are watching Inception. I have seen it a few times before, and I am happy to watch it again. I think it is pretty sweet that we are watching a movie-especially a movie as enjoyable as Inception- this early into the year. However, the purpose of viewing this movie in class is not just for our entertainment, it is to highlight and help us understand the characteristics of modernism. I am surprised by how many modernist themes director Christopher Nolan works into Inception. According to my notes, the Modernism Movement was over by the 1960's, but its been 50 years since then. It is interesting that, after all this time, we can still find modernism in today's works.
            Today, Inception is welcomed as a fresh and unique movie, but, Christopher Nolan smartly followed in the footsteps of modernists authors like the ones we have learned/will be learning about in class. These authors focused on everyday things and the conflict of a typical character. Of course the premise of the film is extremely complicated, ambitious, and can be hard to understand, but the things that make the film great, like Cobb's conflict with his own subconscious, are simple, everyday things that reflect reality and that is modernism at work. It is not an everyday reality for us to share dreams and do some of the things the characters in the film do, but I think we can all relate to being at war with ourselves.

            

1 comment:

  1. Fantastic post, Nick. I also think that it is amazing that a movie made 50 years after the modernist movement is held so highly. I would say that the modernist principles are retro, as people born after the 1950s would not have seen a film that implements these principles, whereas someone that did experience the modernist movement would feel some nostalgia to the principles that were present in popular media so long ago.

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