Inception 

is a 2010 American science fiction thriller film, which was written, produced, and directed

by Christopher Nolan. The film stars Leonardo DiCaprio, Ken Watanabe, Joseph Gordon-
Levitt, Marion Cotillard, Ellen Page, Tom Hardy, Cillian Murphy, Dileep Rao, Tom Berenger,
and Michael Caine. DiCaprio plays Dom Cobb, a specialized spy or corporate espionage thief. His
work consists of secretly extracting valuable commercial information from the unconscious mind of
his targets while they are asleep and dreaming. Unable to visit his children, Cobb is offered a
chance to regain his old life in exchange for an almost impossible task: "inception", the planting of
an idea into a target's subconscious.[5]

Development began roughly nine years before Inception was released. In 2001, Nolan wrote an 80-
page treatment about dream-stealers, presenting the idea to Warner Bros. The story was originally
envisioned as a horror film, inspired by concepts of lucid dreaming and dream incubation.[6]

Feeling he needed to have more experience with large-scale films,[7] Nolan opted to work
on Batman Begins, The Prestige, and The Dark Knight. He spent six months polishing up the script
for Inception before Warner Bros. purchased it in February 2009.[8] Filming spanned six countries
and four continents, beginning in Tokyo on June 19, 2009, and finishing in Canada in late
November of the same year.

Inception was officially budgeted at $160 million, a cost that was split between Warner Bros.
and Legendary Pictures.[3] Nolan's reputation and success with The Dark Knight helped secure the
film's $100 million in advertising expenditure.[3] Inception premiered in London on July 8, 2010, and
was released in both conventional and IMAX theaters on July 14, 2010.[9][10] Released to critical
acclaim, the film grossed over $21 million on its opening day, with an opening weekend gross of
$62.7 million.[4] It received 8 8 Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, Original
Screenplay (Nolan), and Cinematography (Pfister).

Contents
 [hide]

1 Plot

2 Cast

3 Production

o 3.1 Origins

o 3.2 Development

o 3.3 Filming

o 3.4 Visual

effects
 o 3.5 Ending

4 Music

o 4.1 Track listing

5 Marketing

6 Release

o 6.1 Box-office

performance

o 6.2 Critical

response

o 6.3 Home media

o 6.4 Video game

o 6.5 Accolades

7 References

8 Further reading

9 External links

Plot
Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) and along with his partner Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) perform
illegal corporate espionage by entering the subconscious minds of their targets, using two-level
"dream within a dream" strategies to "extract" valuable information. Each of the "extractors" carries
a "totem", a personalized small object whose behavior is unpredictable to anyone except to the
totem's owner, to determine if they are within another person's dream. Cobb's totem is a spinning
top which spins perpetually in the dream state. Cobb struggles with memories of his dead wife Mal
(Marion Cotillard) that manifest within the dream and try to sabotage his efforts.

Cobb is approached by the wealthy Mr. Saito (Ken Watanabe) asking them to perform the act of
"inception", planting an idea within the person's subconscious mind. Saito wishes to break up the
vast energy empire of his competitor, the ailing Maurice Fischer (Pete Postlethwaite), by suggesting
this idea to his son Robert Fischer (Cillian Murphy) who will inherit the empire when his father dies.
Should Cobb succeed, Saito promises to use his influence to clear Cobb of the murder charges for
his wife's death, allowing Cobb to re-enter the United States and reunite with his children. Cobb
assembles his team: Eames (Tom Hardy), an identity forger; Yusuf (Dileep Rao), a chemist who
concocts the powerful sedative needed to stabilize the layers of the shared dream; and Ariadne
(Ellen Page), a young student architect tasked with designing the labyrinth of the dream
landscapes. While planning the inception, Ariadne learns of the guilt Cobb struggles with from Mal's
suicide and his separation from his children when he fled the country as a fugitive.

The job is set into motion when Maurice Fischer dies and his son accompanies his father's body
from Sydney to Los Angeles. During the flight, Cobb sedates Fischer, and the team bring him into a
three-level shared dream. At each stage, the member of the team who is "creating" the dream
remains while the other team members fall asleep within the dream to travel further down into
Fischer's subconscious. The dreamers will then ride a synchronized system of "kicks" (a car diving
off a bridge, a falling elevator, and a collapsing building) back up the levels to wake up to reality. In
the first level, Yusuf's dream of a rainy city, the team successfully abducts Fischer, but the team is
attacked by Fischer's militarized subconscious projections, which have been trained to hunt and kill
extractors. Saito is mortally wounded during the shoot-out, but due to the strength of Yusuf's
sedative, dying in the dream will send them into limbo, a deep subconscious level where they may
lose their grip on reality and be trapped indefinitely.

Eames takes the appearance of Fischer's godfather Peter Browning (Tom Berenger) to suggest that
he reconsider his opinion of his father's will. Yusuf remains on the first level driving a van through
the streets, while the remaining characters enter Arthur's dream, taking place in a corporate hotel.
Cobb turns Fischer against Browning and persuades him to join the team as Arthur runs point, and
they descend to the third dream level, a snowy mountain fortress dreamed by Eames, which
Fischer is told represents Browning's subconscious. Yusuf's evasive driving on the first level
manifests as distorted gravity effects on the second and an avalanche on the third.

Saito succumbs to his wounds, and Cobb's projection of Mal sabotages the plan by shooting
Fischer dead.[11] Cobb and Ariadne elect to enter limbo to find Saito. There, Cobb confronts his
projection of Mal, who tries to convince him to stay with her and his kids in limbo. Cobb refuses and
confesses that he was responsible for Mal's suicide: to help her escape from limbo during a shared
dream experience, he inspired in her the idea that her world wasn't real. Once she had returned to
reality, she became convinced that she was still dreaming and needed to die in order to wake up.
Through his confession, Cobb attains catharsis and chooses to remain in limbo to search for Saito;
Eames defibrillates Fischer to bring him back up to the third-level mountain fortress, where he
enters a safe room and discovers and accepts the idea to split up his father's business empire.

Leaving Cobb behind, the team members escape by riding the kicks back up the levels of the
dream. Cobb eventually finds an elderly Saito who has been waiting in limbo for decades in dream
time (just a few hours in real time), and the two help each other to remember their arrangement.
The team awakens on the flight; Saito arranges for Cobb to get through U.S. customs, and he goes
home to reunite with his children. Cobb uses his spinning top to test reality but is distracted by his
children before he sees the result.

Cast

The cast at a premiere for the film in July 2010. From left to right: Cillian Murphy, Marion Cotillard, Joseph Gordon-
Levitt, Ellen Page, Ken Watanabe, Michael Caine, and Leonardo DiCaprio.

 Leonardo DiCaprio as Dom Cobb, a professional thief who specializes in conning secrets

from his victims by infiltrating their dreams. Cobb leads a team consisting of Arthur, Ariadne,
Eames, Saito, and Yusuf, with the goal of influencing Fischer Jr's actions via his dreams.
DiCaprio was the first actor to be cast in the film.[12] Nolan had been trying to work with the actor
for years and met him several times, but was unable to convince him to appear in any of his
films until Inception.[13]
 Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Arthur, Cobb's partner who takes "point" during jobs and is
responsible for researching the team's targets.
 Ellen Page as Ariadne, a graduate student who is recruited to construct the various
dreamscapes, which are described as mazes. The name Ariadnealludes to a princess of Greek
myth, daughter of King Minos, who aided the hero Theseus by giving him a sword and a ball of
string to help him navigate the labyrinth which was the prison of the Minotaur.[14]
 Tom Hardy as Eames, a sharp-tongued associate of Cobb's. Eames uses his ability to take
the form of others inside the dream world in order to manipulate Fischer Jr. in his own dreams.
 Ken Watanabe as Mr. Saito, a businessman who employs Cobb for the team's mission, and
insists on joining them inside.[15]
 Dileep Rao as Yusuf, a chemist who formulates the drugs needed to sustain the dream
states.
 Cillian Murphy as Robert Michael Fischer Jr., the heir to a business empire and the team's
target.[16]
 Tom Berenger as Peter Browning, Fischer Jr.'s godfather and fellow executive at the
Fischers' company.[1]
 Marion Cotillard as Mallorie "Mal" Cobb, Dom Cobb's projection of his deceased wife and a
frequent, malevolent presence in his dreams. As the film's main antagonist, she is a
manifestation of his guilt about the real Mal's suicide. Dom is unable to control these projections
of her, challenging his abilities as an extractor.[13]
 Pete Postlethwaite as Maurice Fischer, Robert's dying father.[17]
 Michael Caine as Prof. Stephen Miles, Cobb's mentor and father-in-law,[17] and Ariadne's
college professor who recommends her to the team.[18]
 Lukas Haas as Nash, an architect in Cobb's employment who is replaced by Ariadne.[19]
 Miranda Nolan plays a minor role as an air hostess. Miranda is a first cousin to the film's
director Christopher Nolan.[20]
Production
Origins

Penrose stairs are incorporated into the film as an example of the impossible objects that can be created in lucid
dream worlds.

Inception was first developed by Christopher Nolan, based on the notion of "exploring the idea of
people sharing a dream space — entering a dream space and sharing a dream. That gives you the
ability to access somebody’s unconscious mind. What would that be used and abused
for?"[12] Furthermore, he thought "being able to extract information from somebody’s brain would be
the obvious use of that because obviously any other system where it’s computers or physical
media, whatever — things that exist outside the mind — they can all be stolen ... up until this point,
or up until this movie I should say, the idea that you could actually steal something from
somebody’s head was impossible. So that, to me, seemed a fascinating abuse or misuse of that
kind of technology."[12] Nolan drew inspiration from the works of Jorge Luis Borges when
writing Inception,[21][22] and also cited the 2006 anime film Paprika by the late Satoshi Kon as an
influence.[23][24]

Nolan had thought about these ideas on and off since he was sixteen years old, intrigued by how he
would wake up and then, while falling back into a lighter sleep, hold on to the awareness that he
was dreaming, a lucid dream. He also became aware of the feeling that he could study the place
and alter the events of the dream.[25] He said, "I tried to work that idea of manipulation and
management of a conscious dream being a skill that these people have. Really the script is based
on those common, very basic experiences and concepts, and where can those take you? And the
only outlandish idea that the film presents, really, is the existence of a technology that allows you to
enter and share the same dream as someone else."[25] Harvard University dream researcher Deirdre
Barrett points out that Nolan did not get every detail accurate regarding dreams, but that films which
really do that tend to have illogical, rambling, disjointed plots which wouldn’t make for a great
thriller. "But he did get many aspects right," she said, citing the scene in which a sleeping DiCaprio
is shoved into a full bath and water starts gushing into the windows of the building he is dreaming,
waking him up. "That's very much how real stimuli get incorporated, and you very often wake up
right after that intrusion."[26]

Development
Initially, Nolan wrote an 80-page treatment about dream-stealers.[21] Originally, Nolan had
envisioned Inception as a horror film,[21] but eventually wrote it as a heist film even though he found
that "traditionally [they] are very deliberately superficial in emotional terms."[25] Upon revisiting his
script, he decided that basing it in that genre did not work because the story "relies so heavily on
the idea of the interior state, the idea of dream and memory. I realized I needed to raise the
emotional stakes."[25] Nolan worked on the script for nine to ten years.[12] When he first started
thinking about making the film, Nolan was influenced by "that era of movies where you had The
Matrix, you had Dark City, you had The Thirteenth Floor and, to a certain extent, you had Memento,
too. They were based in the principles that the world around you might not be real."[25]

Nolan first pitched the film to Warner Bros. in 2001, but then felt that he needed more experience
making large-scale films, and embarked on Batman Begins and The Dark Knight.[7] He soon
realized that a film like Inception needed a large budget because "as soon as you’re talking about
dreams, the potential of the human mind is infinite. And so the scale of the film has to feel infinite. It
has to feel like you could go anywhere by the end of the film. And it has to work on a massive
scale."[7] After making The Dark Knight, Nolan decided to make Inception and spent six months
completing the script.[7] Nolan states that the key to completing the script was wondering what would
happen if several people shared the same dream. "Once you remove the privacy, you’ve created an
infinite number of alternative universes in which people can meaningfully interact, with validity, with
weight, with dramatic consequences."[27]

Leonardo DiCaprio was the first actor to be cast in the film.[12] Nolan had been trying to work with
the actor for years and met him several times, but was unable to convince him to appear in any of
his films until Inception. DiCaprio finally agreed because he was "intrigued by this concept — this
dream-heist notion and how this character's going to unlock his dreamworld and ultimately affect his
real life."[28] He read the script and found it to be "very well written, comprehensive but you really
had to have Chris in person, to try to articulate some of the things that have been swirling around
his head for the last eight years."[7] DiCaprio and Nolan spent months talking about the screenplay.
Nolan took a long time re-writing the script in order "to make sure that the emotional journey of his
character was the driving force of the movie."[12] On February 11, 2009, it was announced
that Warner Bros. purchased Inception, a spec script written by Nolan.[8]

Filming
Principal photography began in Tokyo on June 19, 2009, for the scene where Saito first hires Cobb
during a helicopter flight over the city.[21][29] The production moved to England and shot
in Cardington, a converted airship hangar north of London.[30] It was there that a hotel bar set was
constructed that could be tilted 30 degrees.[31] A long hotel corridor was also constructed by
production designerGuy Hendrix Dyas, special effects supervisor Chris Corbould, and
cinematographer Wally Pfister; this corridor was able to rotate a full 360 degrees to create the effect
of alternate directions of gravity for scenes where dream-sector physics become chaotic. This idea
was inspired by a similar technique used in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey. Nolan said,
"I was interested in taking those ideas, techniques and philosophies and applying them to an action
scenario".[32] The filmmakers originally planned to make the hallway 40 ft (12 m) long but as the
action sequence became more elaborate, the hallway's length grew to 100 ft (30 m). The corridor
was suspended along eight large concentric rings that were spaced equidistantly outside its walls
and powered by two massive electric motors.[30] Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who plays Arthur, spent
several weeks learning to fight in a corridor that spun like "a giant hamster wheel".[25] Nolan said of
the device, "It was like some incredible torture device; we thrashed Joseph for weeks, but in the end
we looked at the footage, and it looks unlike anything any of us has seen before. The rhythm of it is
unique, and when you watch it, even if you know how it was done, it confuses your perceptions. It's
unsettling in a wonderful way".[25] Gordon-Levitt remembered, "it was six-day weeks of just, like,
coming home at night fuckin' battered ... The light fixtures on the ceiling are coming around on the
floor, and you have to choose the right time to cross through them, and if you don't, you're going to
fall."[33] On July 15, 2009, filming took place at University College London library. The signage of the
library was changed to read "bibliothèque" (French for "library").[21]

Filming moved to France where they shot the pivotal scene between Ariadne and Cobb at
a Paris bistro.[34] For the explosion that takes place during this scene, the local authorities would not
allow the actual use of explosives. The production used high-pressure nitrogen to create the effect
of a series of explosions. Pfister used six high-speed cameras to capture the sequence from
different angles and make sure that they got the shot. The visual effects department enhanced the
sequence, adding more destruction and flying debris.[34] The next location that the production
traveled to was Tangierswhich doubled for Mombasa, where Cobb hires Eames and Yusuf. A foot
chase was shot in the streets and alleyways of the historic Grand Souk.[35] To capture this
sequence, Pfister employed a mix of hand-held camera and Steadicam work.[36] Tangiers was also
used to film an important riot scene during the initial foray into Saito's mind.

Filming moved to the Los Angeles area where some sets were built on a Warner Bros. sound stage,
including the interior rooms of Saito's Japanese-style castle. The dining room was inspired by
theNijo Castle built around 1603. These sets were inspired by a mix of Japanese architecture and
Western influences.[36] The production also staged a multi-vehicle car chase on the streets of
downtown L.A. and this also involved bringing a freight train down the middle of a street.[37] To do
this, the filmmakers configured a train engine on the chassis of a tractor trailer. The replica was
made fromfiberglass molds taken from authentic train parts and then matched in terms of color and
design.[38] Also, the car chase was supposed to be set in the midst of a downpour but the L.A.
weather stayed typically sunny. The filmmakers were forced to set up elaborate effects (e.g.,
rooftop water cannons) to give the audience the impression that the weather was overcast and
soggy. L.A. was also the site of the climactic scene where a Ford Econoline van flies off
the Commodore Schuyler F. Heim Bridge in slow motion.[39] This sequence was filmed on and off for
months with the van being shot out of a cannon according to actor Dileep Rao. Capturing the actors
suspended within the van in slow motion took a whole day to film. Once the van landed in the water
the challenge for the actors was not to panic. "And when they ask you to act, it's a bit of an ask,"
explained Cillian Murphy.[39] The actors had to be underwater for four to five minutes while drawing
air from scuba tanks; underwater buddy breathing is shown in this sequence.[39]

The final phase of principal photography took place in Alberta in late November 2009. The location
manager discovered a temporarily closed ski resort, Fortress Mountain.[40] An elaborate set was
assembled near the top station of the Canadian chairlift, taking three months to build.[41] The
production had to wait for a huge snowstorm, which eventually arrived.[21] The ski-chase sequence
was inspired by Nolan's favorite James Bond film, On Her Majesty's Secret Service: "What I liked
about it that we've tried to emulate in this film is there's a tremendous balance in that movie of
action and scale and romanticism and tragedy and emotion."[42]

The film was shot primarily in the anamorphic format on 35 mm film, with key sequences filmed
on 65 mm, and certain other sequences in VistaVision. Nolan did not shoot any footage
with IMAXcameras as he had with The Dark Knight. "We didn’t feel that we were going to be able to
shoot in IMAX because of the size of the cameras because this film given that it deals with a
potentially surreal area, the nature of dreams and so forth, I wanted it to be as realistic as possible.
Not be bound by the scale of those IMAX cameras, even though I love the format dearly".[12] Nolan
also chose not to shoot any of the film in 3-D as he believes that shooting on digital video does not
offer a high enough quality image,[12] and that he prefers to shoot using prime lenses, which aren't
possible with 3D cameras.[43] Nolan has also criticised the dim image that 3D projection produces,
and disputes that traditional film does not allow realistic depth perception, saying "I think it's a
misnomer to call it 3D versus 2D. The whole point of cinematic imagery is it's three dimensional...
You know 95% of our depth cues come from occlusion, resolution, color and so forth, so the idea of
calling a 2D movie a '2D movie' is a little misleading."[44] Nolan did test converting Inception into 3D
in post production but decided that, while it was possible, he lacked the time to complete the
conversion to a standard he was happy with.[44][21]

Cinematographer Wally Pfister gave each location and dream level a distinctive look with the
mountain fortress having a sterile, cool look, the hotel hallways had warm hues and the van scenes
were neutral.[45] This was done so that the audience would know immediately where they were
during the heavily crosscut portion of the film.[45]

Nolan has said that the film "deals with levels of reality, and perceptions of reality which is
something I'm very interested in. It's an action film set in a contemporary world, but with a slight
science-fiction bent to it," while also describing it as "very much an ensemble film structured
somewhat as a heist movie. It's an action adventure that spans the globe".[46]

Visual effects
For dream sequences in Inception, Nolan kept the computer-generated effects to a minimum and
preferred to use practical methods whenever possible. Nolan said, "It's always very important to me
to do as much as possible in-camera, and then, if necessary, computer graphics are very useful to
build on or enhance what you have achieved physically."[47] To this end, visual effects supervisor
Paul Franklin built a miniature of the Fortress Mountain Resort set and then blew it up for the film.
For the fight scene that takes place in zero gravity, he used CG-based effects to "subtly bend
elements like physics, space and time."[48]

The most challenging effect was Limbo City at the end of the film because it continually developed
during production. Franklin had artists build concepts while Nolan gave his ideal vision: "Something
glacial, with clear modernist architecture, but with chunks of it breaking off into the sea like
icebergs".[48] Franklin and his team ended up with "something that looked like an iceberg version
of Gotham City with water running through it."[48] They created a basic model of a glacier and then
designers created a program that added elements like roads, intersections and ravines until they
had a complex, yet organic-looking, cityscape. For the Paris-folding sequence, Franklin had artists
producing concept sketches and then they created rough computer animations to give them an idea
of what the sequence looked like while in motion. Later during principal photography, Nolan was
able to direct Leonardo DiCaprio and Ellen Page based on this rough computer animation Franklin
had [Link] had close to 500 visual effects shots (in comparison, Batman Begins had
approximately 620) which is considered minor in comparison to contemporary visual effects epics
that can have around 1,500 or 2,000 VFX shots.[48]

Ending
The film cuts to the end credits from a shot of the top wobbling ambiguously, inviting speculation
about whether the final sequence was reality or another dream. Nolan confirmed that the ambiguity
was deliberate, saying "I've been asked the question more times than I've ever been asked any
other question about any other film I've made... What's funny to me is that people really do expect
me to answer it."[49] The film's script concludes with "Behind him, on the table, the spinning top is
STILL SPINNING. And we — FADE OUT"[50] However, Christopher Nolan also said, "I put that cut
there at the end, imposing an ambiguity from outside the film. That always felt the right ending to
me — it always felt like the appropriate 'kick' to me… The real point of the scene — and this is what
I tell people — is that Cobb isn't looking at the top. He's looking at his kids. He's left it behind. That's
the emotional significance of the thing."[51]

In a September 2010 interview, Michael Caine, who plays Cobb's father-in-law, explained his
interpretation of the ending by saying, "If I'm there it's real, because I'm never in the dream. I'm the
guy who invented the dream."[52] Nolan himself interprets the ending as a return to reality, but noted
that "I choose to believe that Cobb gets back to his kids, because I have young kids. People who
have kids definitely read it differently than those who don't".[53] He indicated that the top was not the
most crucial element of the ending, saying "I've read plenty of very off-the-wall interpretations... The
most important emotional thing about the top spinning at the end is that Cobb is not looking at it. He
doesn't care."[53]

Music

Inception: Music from the Motion Picture

 Film score by Hans Zimmer

Released July 13, 2010

Genre Soundtrack

Length 49:13

Label Reprise

Hans Zimmer chronology

Henry IV Inception Megamind

(2010) (2010) (2010)

Hans Zimmer scored the film, marking his third collaboration with Nolan following Batman
Begins and The Dark Knight. According to Zimmer, it's "a very electronic score".[54] Nolan asked
Zimmer to compose and finish the score as he was shooting the film. The composer said, "He
wanted to unleash my imagination in the best possible way".[55] At one point, while composing the
score, Zimmer incorporated a guitar sound reminiscent of Ennio Morricone and was interested in
having Johnny Marr, former guitarist in the influential 80s rock band The Smiths, play these parts.
He asked Nolan, who agreed and then Zimmer approached Marr who accepted his offer. Marr
spent four 12-hour days working on the score, playing notes written by Zimmer with a 12-string
guitar.[56]

For inspiration, Zimmer read Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas

Hofstadter because it combined "the idea of playfulness in mathematics and playfulness in music".
[55]
 Zimmer did not assemble a temp score but "every now and then they would call and say 'we
need a little something here.' But that was OK because much of the music pieces aren't that scene
specific. They fall into little categories".[55] While writing the screenplay, Nolan wrote in Édith Piaf's
"Non, je ne regrette rien" but almost took it out when he cast Marion Cotillard, who had just
completed an Oscar-winning turn as Piaf in the 2007 film La Vie en rose. Zimmer convinced Nolan
to keep it in the film and also integrated elements of the song into his score;[56] in particular, the
film's iconic brass instrument fanfare resembles a slowed-down version of the song's
instrumentation.

The trailers for the film feature specially composed music by Zack Hemsey, which does not appear
on the official soundtrack.[57]
Track listing

All tracks written and composed by Hans Zimmer.[58]

Inception: Music from the Motion Picture
No
Title
.
1. "Half Remembered Dream"  
2. "We Built Our Own World"  
3. "Dream Is Collapsing"  
4. "Radical Notion"  
5. "Old Souls"  
6. "528491"  
7. "Mombasa"  
8. "One Simple Idea"  
9. "Dream Within a Dream"  
10. "Waiting for a Train"  
11. "Paradox"  
12. "Time"  
13. "Projections" (bonus track)
14. "Don't Think About Elephants" (bonus track)
Marketing

This section requires expansion.

In the spring of 2010, a viral marketing campaign was started for the film. On June 2, 2010, a
manual was sent out to various companies. The manual was filled with bizarre images and text all
relating to Inception. As the month went on, more and more viral marketing began to surface,
including posters, ads, phone applications, and strange websites all related to the film.[59][60] On June
7, 2010, a behind the scenes featurette on the film was released in HD on Yahoo! Movies.
[61]
 Warner Bros. has spent $100 million marketing the film.[62]

Release
Box-office performance
See also: List of highest-grossing films

Inception was released in both conventional and IMAX theaters on July 16, 2010.[9][63] The film had
its world premiere at Leicester Square in London, England on July 8, 2010.[64] In the United States
and Canada, Inception was released theatrically in 3,792 conventional theaters and
195 IMAX theaters.[9] The film grossed $23.7 million during its opening day on July 16, 2010, with
midnight screenings in 1,500 locations.[65] Overall the film made $62.7 million and debuted at #1 on
its opening weekend.[66] Inception's opening weekend gross made it the second highest-grossing
debut for a stand-alone[clarification needed] science-fiction film, falling behind Avatar’s $77 million opening
weekend gross in 2009.[66] In its second and third weekends the film held the top spot with drops of
just 32% ($42.7 million) and 36% ($27.5 million) respectively.[67][68] In its fourth week of release, the
film fell to the second spot to The Other Guys.

Inception grossed $292 million in the United States and Canada and $531 million overseas. In total,
the film has grossed $823 million worldwide.[4] It is the second-highest-grossing Christopher
Nolanmovie in the U.S. and Canada, behind The Dark Knight which grossed $533 million, the
highest-grossing one overseas, and the second highest-grossing one worldwide behind The Dark
Knight (which grossed $1.002 billion overall).[69] It is the third 2010 film that reaches the $800-million
mark worldwide, while, in overseas earnings, it is the third picture of 2010 that crosses the $500-
million mark.[70]Additionally, it is Leonardo DiCaprio's second highest-grossing film right
behind Titanic.[71]

It became the highest-grossing Crime time, Heist/caper and Mindbender movie ever at the North

American box office.[4] In these territories, it is also the fifth highest-grossing film of 2010.
[72]
Internationally, it became the fourth-highest-grossing 2010 release behind Toy Story 3, Alice in
Wonderland and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 and it is currently the 25th highest-
grossing film of all time. Its five highest-grossing markets after the U.S.A. and Canada
are China ($68 million), the United Kingdom, Ireland and Malta ($56 million), France and
the Maghreb region ($43 million),Japan ($40 million) and South Korea ($38 million).[73]

Critical response

Producer Emma Thomas and directorChristopher Nolan at a panel for the film atWonderCon in April 2010
The film opened to strongly positive reviews. Many critics have applauded Inception as a smart and
innovative story, as well as the cast, score, and memorable action scenes.[74] Review
aggregate Rotten Tomatoes reports that 87% of critics have given the film a positive review based
on 272 reviews, with an average score of 8/10. The website reported the critical consensus, "Smart,
innovative, and thrilling, Inception is that rare summer blockbuster that succeeds viscerally as well
as intellectually."[75] Review aggregator Metacritic assigned the film a weighted average score of 74
(out of 100) based on 42 reviews from mainstream critics, considered to be "Generally favorable
reviews."[76] CinemaScore polls conducted during the opening weekend revealed the average grade
cinemagoers gave Inception was B+ on an A+ to F scale.[77]

Rolling Stone magazine's Peter Travers gave Inception its first positive notice, calling it a "wildly

ingenious chess game," and added "the result is a knockout."[78] In his review for Variety, Justin
Chang praised the film as "a conceptual tour de force" and wrote, "applying a vivid sense of
procedural detail to a fiendishly intricate yarn set in the labyrinth of the unconscious mind, the
writer-director has devised a heist thriller for surrealists, a Jungian's Rififi, that challenges viewers to
sift through multiple layers of (un)reality."[79] Jim Vejvoda of IGN rated the film perfect, deeming it "a
singular accomplishment from a filmmaker who has only gotten better with each film."[80] Relevant
Magazine's David Roark called it Nolan's greatest accomplishment, saying, "Visually, intellectually
and emotionally, Inception is a masterpiece."[81]

Empire magazine rated it five stars in the August 2010 issue and wrote, "it feels like Stanley
Kubrick adapting the work of the great sci-fi author William Gibson ... Nolan delivers another true
original: welcome to an undiscovered country."[82] Entertainment Weekly gave the film a B+ rating
and Lisa Schwarzbaum wrote, "It's a rolling explosion of images as hypnotizing and sharply angled
as any in a drawing by M.C. Escher or a state-of-the-biz videogame; the backwards splicing of
Nolan's own Memento looks rudimentary by comparison."[83] The New York Post gave the film a four
star rating andLou Lumenick wrote, "DiCaprio, who has never been better as the tortured hero,
draws you in with a love story that will appeal even to non-sci-fi fans."[84] Roger Ebert of the Chicago
Sun-Times awarded the film a perfect four stars and said that Inception "is all about process, about
fighting our way through enveloping sheets of reality and dream, reality within dreams, dreams
without reality. It's a breathtaking juggling act."[85] Richard Roeper, also of The Chicago Sun-Times,
gave Inception a perfect score of "A+" and noted that it is "one of the best movies of the [21st]
century."[86]

In his review for the Chicago Tribune, Michael Phillips gave the film 3 stars out of 4 and wrote, "I
found myself wishing Inception were weirder, further out ... the film is Nolan's labyrinth all the way,
and it's gratifying to experience a summer movie with large visual ambitions and with nothing more
or less on its mind than (as Shakespeare said) a dream that hath no bottom."[87] Time magazine's
Richard Corliss wrote the film's "noble intent is to implant one man's vision in the mind of a vast
audience ... The idea of moviegoing as communal dreaming is a century old. With Inception,
viewers have a chance to see that notion get a state-of-the-art update."[88] Los Angeles
Times’ Kenneth Turan felt that Nolan was able to blend "the best of traditional and modern
filmmaking. If you're searching for smart and nervy popular entertainment, this is what it looks
like."[89] USA Today rated the film three-and-a-half stars out of four and Claudia Puig felt that Nolan
"regards his viewers as possibly smarter than they are—or at least as capable of rising to his
inventive level. That's a tall order. But it's refreshing to find a director who makes us stretch, even
occasionally struggle, to keep up."[90]

Not all reviewers, however, gave the film positive reviews. New York magazine's David
Edelstein was reported to "have no idea what so many people are raving about. It’s as if someone
went into their heads while they were sleeping and planted the idea that Inception is a visionary
masterpiece and—hold on ... Whoa! I think I get it. The movie is a metaphor for the power of
delusional hype—a metaphor for itself."[91] Rex Reed of The New York Observer explained the film's
development as "pretty much what we've come to expect from summer movies in general and
Christopher Nolan movies in particular ... [it] doesn't seem like much of an accomplishment to
me."[92] A. O. Scott of The New York Times commented "there is a lot to see in Inception, there is
nothing that counts as genuine vision. Mr. Nolan’s idea of the mind is too literal, too logical, too rule-
bound to allow the full measure of madness."[93]

Home media
Inception was released on DVD and Blu-ray on December 3, 2010, in France and the week after in
the UK and USA (December 7, 2010).[citation needed]

On November 12, 2010, Warner Bros. made available in the United States an Inception Limited
Edition Blu-ray/DVD with Briefcase Gift Set which included a metal replica of the briefcase used in
the film along with other extra features such as a metal replica of the spinning top totem used in the
movie. The special U.S. edition set was limited to a production run of less than 2000 and sold out
that weekend.[94]

Video game
In a November 2010 interview, Nolan expressed his intention to develop a video game set in
the Inception universe, working with a team of collaborators. He described it as "a longer-term
proposition", referring to the medium of video games as "something I’ve wanted to explore".[95]

Accolades
Main article: List of accolades received by Inception
The nominees for the 68th Golden Globe Awards were announced on December 14th, 2010,
and Inception was nominated for four awards, including Best Picture (Drama), Best Director, Best
Screenplay, and Best Original Score. [96]