Behind the Special Effects of Inception

Lanxon writes "Wired has a behind the scenes look at how Inception's reality-distorting special effects sequences were shot, in an interview with Chris Corbould — the man 'prized for his ability to stage a real-life tank chase in St. Petersburg (GoldenEye), to flip a working juggernaut down a narrow Chicago street (The Dark Knight), and to build a working Batmobile that can do 30-metre jumps without the aid of a single post-production pixel.'" Hopefully most of you who intend to see Inception have already seen it by now, so you don't have to worry about spoilers. It's getting pretty much universal praise.

Comments

Spoiler Alert

[Haffner]

It's all a dream

Just kidding. No one knows what the hell happened.

Re:Spoiler Alert

[somaTh]

The GP wasn't kidding. No one knows what the hell happened.

Although, this guy seems to have some solid idea.

Re:Spoiler Alert

[rolfwind]

It's a movie, the whole thing was Nolan's dream. He shared it with us.

Re:Spoiler Alert

[Minwee]

It's not a dream, but he's really a replicant.

Re:Spoiler Alert

[ukyoCE]

He was dreaming at the end, the top didn't fall. Considering the slow zoom in on the top, if the filmmaker intended anyone to interpret the ending as reality, the top would have fallen. The wobble was just to elicit groans from the audience as it failed to fall, and made us start cranking our minds to figure out what happened.

The simple and non-ambiguous ending is that he is in a dream because Saito shot him. The last scene before Cobb woke up was Saito picking up a handgun. This was Saito's plan all along. He sent Cobb back to limbo after planting the idea (inception) that Cobb would be able to make it through customs. This allowed him to life a life with his kids. Well, his creepy fake dream kids.

There are many more complicated theories, but I think this is the intended "obvious" ending.

Re:Spoiler Alert

[Ephemeriis]

Guess I'm sentimental, and wanted it all to be real for him.

It is real for him, regardless of whether it is a dream or not.

Just like those were real emotions that you were feeling, despite it all being fiction on a screen.

Re:Spoiler Alert

[MikeBabcock]

I think the obvious ending is that we're not supposed to know.

I think its quite obvious the director wanted to have a good 'hehe, I'm not telling' inside joke with his audience, and I'm good with that.

Your version is just one possibility of how things may have turned out. The truth is, we weren't told.

Re:Spoiler Alert

[nine-times]

Ok, this might not be the place for this, but I'm pretty sure this is the real deal (spoilers, obviously):

When Cobb's wife killed herself, she was correct in thinking that they lived in a dream. She escaped into reality. When he didn't wake up, she went back in to rescue him. She's pulling a Mr. Charles, posing as part of his own unconscious. However, her attempts to get him to realize he was dreaming were always based on making his dream life worse, which as Cobb tells us, doesn't work. Positive feelings are stronger.

In the end, she creates an inception in him-- the idea of a friend coming into his dreams to rescue him, and the idea that escaping from the dream will allow him to be with his loved ones. The Inception works, but takes some time to grow-- so he doesn't snap out of things immediately, but the top spinning at the end is a sign that the process has worked.

The big question in my mind is, who in the dream is real? Is Mal pulling the Inception all by herself, or are some of the characters members of her team? My guess is that Ariadne and Saito are part of Mal's team, or else she's sometimes masquerading as them (the way the forger does).

Re:Spoiler Alert

[city]

He wasn't dreaming at the end, the top wobbled. Considering the slow zoom in on the top, if the filmmaker intended anyone to interpret the ending as dream, the top wouldn't have wobbled. The wobble was just to elicit groans from the audience as it started to fall, and made us start cranking our minds to figure out what happened.

The simple and non-ambiguous ending is that he isn't in a dream because Saito shot him, waking him up. The last scene before Cobb woke up was Saito picking up a handgun. This was Cobb's plan all along. He sent Fischer back to reality after planting the idea (inception) that Fischer would be able to break up his father's empire. This allowed Cobb to live a life with his kids. Well, his creepy motherless kids.

There are many more complicated theories, but I think this is the intended "obvious" ending.

Re:Spoiler Alert

[Abcd1234]

Yeah, ok. You guys are so logical. I enjoyed the movie a lot, but got choked up at the end when he finally got to see his kids. I wanted to rush home and wake mine up and hug them. Guess I'm sentimental, and wanted it all to be real for him.

That's actually kinda the point, though. The movie philosophy is really rooted in the old idea that reality is in the mind. If you hold to that belief, then it doesn't matter that, in the end, he was asleep, as to him, what he was experiencing is reality.

Re:Spoiler Alert

[IICV]

Eh? I thought the obvious ending was that his wife was right, and they were still in a dream even after getting run over by a train. Her projection even points it out, that he's being chased by a faceless international corporation (aka someone else's projections are hunting him down).

Further, as is common with most movies, everything begins in medias res, or in the middle of things - we don't have any idea what he was doing before the movie started (or before the prequel comic, if you read that), everything just gets going. Several times in the movie they point out that one of the ways you can tell you're in a dream is that you don't know how you got to the present state, you just assume there's a reason and go with the flow. We just don't notice it in reference to the movie itself because that's how movies work, but really think about it - what was Cobb doing before going into Saito's head? What was he doing before the Kobol heist in the comic? Everything just kinda started.

What of the other characters? Well, we see quite frequently that Cobb is capable of projecting his own subconscious into other people's dreams (Mal, the train). All we need to do is apply that to them. He's projecting the main characters of the movie into the dream, in order to provide his own backup. Isn't it just convenient that all the people he needs exist and are free, or can be convinced to join in? We as viewers of a movie don't think twice about that, because that's included in the basic structure of a heist movie; you have to gather the best experts in the field, after all. However, in real life, someone as talented as Eames probably wouldn't just be sitting around in Africa doing nothing, he'd have his own agenda.

On further inspection, it's pretty clear that the various characters can also be described in terms of Cobb. Arthur and Eames are just blatantly obvious: Arthur is Cobb's cold logic, capable of perplexing logical twists, quiet and methodological, rule-bound but those rules can be incredibly complex (see his explanation of the infinite staircase and his use of it in combat, for instance, or his rocket propelled elevator idea). Eames, on the other hand, is wild inspiration and crazy dreams, with his leaps of illogic (he's the only character who expresses any interest in knowing what Fisher finds in the chamber, for instance). For example, when the idea of inception was presented to Arthur, he immediately said "no, it's not possible" - he clearly knows it can be done, but what he's saying is we can't do it. Eames immediately says "Oh yeah, totally doable", because his ego knows no bounds.

Ariadne (the architect lady) is a little more subtle. Notice how she is insistent on the fact that the "top" level of the movie is the real world? Well, if she is a projection like Mal, then she's a manifestation of Cobb's belief that the "top" level is the topmost level of the dreams, whereas the Mal projection is a manifestation of Cobb's belief that the "top" level is not the topmost level. They fight, Ariadne wins.

The Indian chemist guy I have no idea, he's just kinda there. In terms of a heist movie he's the scaredy cat comic relief character, but he's very subdued and pretty much just a bland generic projection.

Further, in theory Cobb's top doesn't stop spinning if he's in a dream. Watch closely - he never leaves the top alone long enough to know if it's real or not. He always stops it partway, or it falls off the sink, or something; he never just sits and watches it spin until it stops. Of course, mimicking the weight and feel of the top would require someone else had touched to totem before, but that's not hard - we don't know what's happened in a theoretical "higher" level, and in fact because it's Mal's totem she would know it intimately as well.

There's lots more I'm sure, but I've only seen the movie once. However, I think in the final analysis you will find quite a few hints that the movie is intended to bring you to the conclusion that Cobb is in fact still dreaming, and that the layer that is the "top" in the movie is not the "top" in reality.

Not much content

[DIplomatic]

The "article" is only a couple of paragraphs, but it's worth the click to see the pic if nothing else.

I assumed the gravity special effects were all CG, but it's great to know they were done physically!

Re:Not much content

[baturkey]

There's more detail and pictures in this American Cinematographer article:

http://www.theasc.com/ac_magazine/July2010/Inception/page1.php

That's Easy!

[CajunArson]

Wired has a behind the scenes look at how Inception's reality-distorting special effects sequences were shot

That's easy, the just shot the whole movie with an iPhone 4 and invited Steve Jobs to the set.. all the reality distortion you'll ever need!

Wired Spolier

[tekrat]

Here's the spoiler: The Slashdot summary is about as long as the article it links to. WTF? Who allows crap like this to get on the front page?

Nolan is better without FX

[elrous0]

There wasn't hardly anything in the way of special effects in "Memento," and not much in "The Prestige." Yet those were his two best films and much better than this. "Inception" isn't *bad*, mind you. But the fact that people are concentrating so much on its visual effects is probably a good sign that the script isn't strong enough to carry the movie by itself. Everyone walked out of "Memento" way more blown away than they were from this movie, and no one was saying it was because of the cool FX. The farther away Nolan gets from Batcycles and FX, the more he has to concentrate on the script. And that's a good thing.

allegory for memory management

[spiffmastercow]

This is a bit off topic, but all you /.ers need to see this movie, if for no other reason than that it is an allegory for memory management, stack frames, orphaned pointers, etc.

Re:allegory for memory management

[skiflyer]

I am never going to be able to unthink this post... you may have just ruined this movie for me.

WHOOSH!

[Triv]

Y'all're being way too literal - whether the top fell or it didn't, the point of the last shot isn't whether the reality Cobb is in is real or not, the point is that he walked away from the top as it was spinning. He stopped trying to get home because, as far as he was concerned, he was as home as he wanted to be.

Whether the reality we, as an audience, left him in was "real" or not is completely immaterial. Home != reality, necessarily; he ended up where he needed to be.

Re:WHOOSH!

[Anonymous Coward]

far as he was concerned, he was as home as he wanted to be.

BS. He made it abundantly clear in his confrontation with his dead wife's memory that he was *not* satisfied with the idea of only having his kids in a dream. He directly stated that he wanted to be with them "up there," in real life. The entire reason he was even on the mission is because he turned down that easy out.

I will agree that the plot was thin, but this specific point was repeated multiple times. I am surprised you missed it.

Re:WHOOSH!

[Kenja]

The ambiguity of the ending is important, it implies the possibility that not only was his wife right, but still alive and awake.

Re:WHOOSH!

[Dorkmaster Flek]

I would argue that the ambiguity of the ending is important because it plants a seed of an idea in the audience; namely, the idea of whether Cobb is still in a dream or reality. In essence, the movie performs inception on the audience. Pretty cool trick IMO.

I am left wondering

[Goaway]

What on earth is a "working juggernaut"?

Re:I am left wondering

[Chysn]

What on earth is a "working juggernaut"?

I'm an unemployed juggernaut, you insensitive clod!

Re:Spoiler Alert!

[somaTh]

Lies! Snape kills Trinity with Rosebud!

Re:Analog special effects are cool, but...

[Just_Say_Duhhh]

So in "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?" when that truck hit that cow, you thought they really killed a cow with a truck?

No, it was 2 guys in a cow suit. Sadly, one of the guys died filming that scene, but the guy who played the ass-end of the cow survived.

Re:Analog special effects are cool, but...

[Minwee]

Because the sad truth is that not once have I ever seen a CGI-rendered scene that didn't look utterly fake.

I think the phrase you are looking for is that "not once have you ever seen a CGI-rendered scene that you could identify as CGI-rendered that did not look CGI-rendered."

The ones that didn't look utterly fake looked real enough for you to assume that they were real. That's kind of the whole point, you see.

The film rocked on plot, not SFX

[jbarr]

So many people, including my wife, said they just didn't get it. I must really be in the minority, because I thought that it had a similar "wow" factor as "The Matrix", only with plot instead of special effects. I remember watching "The Matrix", and at the scene where Neo got unplugged, I had this overwhelming feeling of "Oh, my, god! I get it! This is so absolutely innovatively cool!" I really had the same feeling when watching Inception. And maybe my delight with it has to do with the fact that I am able to have lucid dreams on occasion. I specifically remember one where I woke up from a dream, somehow realized that I was still dreaming, and then woke up from that. Having personally experienced that made the concept at least understandable.

Granted, it wasn't a perfect movie, and it was probably too long, but I really think it had an innovative depth that hasn't been seen in movies in a long time.

I also feel that though the SFX were cool, this is a movie you really don't need to see on the big screen. The plot carries it well. The wow-factor doesn't come from the SFX, it comes from the plot.

Re:Universal Praise?

[hamiltondaniel]

Just to get the flame war started, I agree with the above. The movie was very cool and was great to watch, it was a lot of fun.

But come on. The basic premise wasn't even capitalized on. Dreams are WEIRD. Dreams are crazy things where ANYTHING can happen. Dreams are absurd, as in Kierkegaard. There were so many precise rules to the way the whole thing worked it wasn't a dream, it was an alternate reality slightly different than ours, but a reality with real laws and rules governing it. Dreams don't have rules. In a dream I can walk down the street and then Paris flips over and then I'm also an egg salad sandwich who kills Hitler with a goose.

The thing with the time dilation was the most absurd. I mean, never mind that just because you have a dream within a dream doesn't mean you have a brain within a brain (which would be kind of necessary to be thinking at, whatever, 1000x normal speed), but really? That's the only way the writers could think up to inject some sense of urgency? He'll be down there for...TEN YEARS! Oh man. What a drag. Should've set the alarm a half hour early today.

All of this is forgiven if the ENTIRE THING (including all the shared dream, machine-doohickey Architect stuff - how does she actually go about building these dream worlds? We only ever see her making cardboard models. Hmm...) is a dream, but then...

Kind of a boring dream.

Egg salad sandwich, man.

Before the theories get all tagential...

[hawks5999]

...about kicks, limbo and sedatives. Here is all the dialog about those topics for everyone who will "remember" a character saying something they never said:

Sedation/Kicks:

Arthur: Three layers down, dreams are going to collapse with the slightest disturbance
Yusuf: Sedation. For sleep stable enough to create three layers of dreaming we'll have to combine it with extremely powerful sedatives.
[Yusuf slaps a sleeping Arthur who doesn't wake up.]
Yusuf: The compound we'll be using to share the dream creates a very clear connection between dreamers whilst actually accelerating brain function.
Cobb: In other words, it gives us more time on each level.
Yusuf: Brain function in the dream will be about twenty times normal. Now when you enter a dream within that dream the effect will be compounded. There's three dreams. 10 hours to...
Eames: I'm sorry, math was never my strong subject. So h-how much time is that?
Cobb: It's a week the first level down. Six months, the second level down. Third level is...
Ariadne: 10 years!
[Cobb nods]
Ariadne: Who'd want to be stuck in a dream for 10 years?
Yusuf: Depends on the dream.
Arthur: So, once we've made the plant, how do we get out? I'm hoping you have something more elegant in mind than shooting me in the head?
Cobb: Kick.
Ariadne: What's a kick?
Eames: This, Ariadne, would be a kick.
[Eames nudges Arthur's chair that is on two legs and Arthur loses balance but catches himself before he falls.]
Cobb: It's that feeling of falling you get that jolts you awake. It snaps you out of the dream.
Arthur: Are we going to feel a kick with this kind of sedation?
Yusuf: Ah! That's the clever part. I customized the sedative to leave inner ear function unimpaired. That way, however deep the sleep, the sleeper still feels falling...
[Yusuf pushes a sleeping Arthur over in a chair. Arthur awakes]
Yusuf: or tipping...
[Yusuf tips a sleeping Arthur over in a chair. Arthur awakes]
Cobb: The trick is to synchronize a kick that can penetrate all three levels.
Arthur: We could use the musical countdown to synchronize the different kicks.

Limbo:
Cobb: Don't do that. Don't do that!
Eames: He's in agony, I'm waking him up.
Cobb: No. It won't wake him up.
Eames: What do you mean it won't wake him up...
Cobb: It won't wake him up.
Eames: ...if we die in a dream we wake up.
Yusuf: Not from this. We're too heavily sedated to wake up that way.
Eames: Right. So what happens when we die?
Cobb: We drop into limbo.
Arthur: Are you serious?!
Ariadne: Limbo?!
Arthur: Unconstructed dream space.
Ariadne: Well, what the hell is down there?
Arthur: Just raw, infinite subconscious. Nothing is down there. Except for whatever might have been left behind by anyone sharing the dream who's been trapped there before. Which in our case is just you.
Ariadne: Well, how long can we be stuck there?
Yusuf: Can't even think about trying to escape until the sedation...
Eames: How long?!
Yusuf: Decades. It could be infinite. I don't know. Ask him. He's the one who's been there.
Arthur: Let's get him upstairs.
Saito:
Eames: Great... Thank you. So now we are trapped in Fischer's mind battling his own private army and if we get killed we'll be lost in limbo till our brains turn to scrambled egg.

More Limbo:
Cobb: How's he doing?
Ariadne: He's in a lot of pain.
Cobb: When we get down to the lower levels, his pain will be less intense.
Ariadne: And if he dies?
Cobb: Worst case scenario: when he wakes up his mind is completely gone.
Saito: Cobb. I'll still honor the arrangement.
Cobb: I appreciate that Saito, but when you wake up you won't even remember that we had an arrangement. Limbo's going to become your reality, you're gonna be lost down there so long that you're going to become an old man...
Saito: ...filled with regret...
Cobb: ...waiting to die alone.
Saito: No. I'll come back. And we'll be yo

maybe you didn't even see a movie...

[Thud457]

no, Nolan's trick was to make you feel you enjoyed paying $9 to see that movie.

Re:maybe you didn't even see a movie...

[HarvardAce]

no, Nolan's trick was to make you feel you enjoyed paying $9 to see that movie.

$9?!? Was that the 10AM showing on a Tuesday morning where they let you bring babies with you?