Chapter 752: An Unprecedented Experience

This was not a typical sci-fi film; perhaps it was more fittingly defined as a "contemporary action sci-fi set within the structure of consciousness." The movie did not depict a future world, but the present reality, where a newly developed Bio-Information Technology allowed people to enter the minds, thoughts, or dreams of others.

To some extent, Inception was like a combination of The Matrix and Minority Report.

A brand-new technology had emerged in the film's world, allowing people to enter the dreams of others, pry into their privacy, and steal important intelligence.

When a person was completely defenseless, dreams became the best pathway into their subconscious. The protagonist, Cobb, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, was a thief—an experienced one, but unlike most pickpockets, he didn't need to rummage through people's wallets.

In this world, there was a very peculiar title for people like him: Extractor.

His specialty was infiltrating people's dreams to steal valuable information and secrets from their subconscious. If necessary, he would even perform further memory transplantation, altering their memories.

As a pioneering Dream Thief, he naturally had a team. He and his team were hired by a wealthy Japanese businessman to invade the dream of another wealthy businessman and implant a memory that would cause the target to dismantle his own company. This was an almost impossible task...

The story was not complicated, but the film employed relatively complex narrative techniques.

Audiences who liked sci-fi films might have noticed this: most sci-fi stories were actually very simple and straightforward. They were nothing more than an alien invasion where an Earthling tried to escape and eventually found a way to defeat the aliens; or suddenly falling under the pursuit of some terrifying monster; or being forced into a life-changing adventure in some bizarre futuristic environment...

This kind of repeatable, imitable, and mass-produced story core was inherently one of the traits of commercial films. If shot well, it would become widely popular. If shot poorly, it would often leave the audience feeling it lacked novelty, was flashy but hollow, and had no personality—much like cloying fast food.

Inception definitely did not belong in that category.

Not long into the screening, many in the audience realized that the film's plot was intricate and full of twists and turns, with subtle and obvious callbacks echoing throughout.

Brad Pitt had his own film company. Besides being a star actor, he was also a highly successful producer. Among all the film studios founded and funded by actors in Hollywood, only Drew Barrymore's Flower Pictures could compare to his.

In his view, from the perspective of sci-fi concepts, the premise of Inception was neither unprecedented nor uniquely novel.

Duke's greatest success clearly lay not in the film's concept, but in his ability to use brilliant narrative and perfect details to make the movie captivating and profound. Most films about virtual reality and dreams still focused on real life because they struggled to present a complete dream world. Duke, however, meticulously demonstrated how to enter a dream, the problems that might arise within it, and how to wake up, allowing the dreamscape to form a fully realized world with its own unique rules, laws, and logic.

Paired with puzzle-solving elements and his consistently outstanding visual effects, the entire film was exceptionally mesmerizing.

Regarding the story, Brad Pitt didn't consider it a suspense thriller, unlike Leonardo's previous film directed by Martin Scorsese, Shutter Island.

Inception clearly wasn't here to test the audience's IQ. Therefore, the plot was complex but not contrived; everything was necessary for this astonishing content. It seemed intricate, yet there was not a single superfluous shot or extra line of dialogue. Casually missing a scene or skipping a conversation would render the viewing experience incomplete.

Moreover, Duke seemed to have tried his best to make the plot clearer, as the whole story had a very obvious main thread: the Extractors, Cobb and Arthur, were commissioned by the wealthy Japanese businessman Saito to invade the consciousness of Young Fischer, the son of Saito's competitor, the wealthy French businessman Old Fischer. Their goal was to make him automatically dissolve his father's company after Old Fischer passed away.

This process was accomplished using layered dreams. During this time, he saw all sorts of incredible visual spectacles, such as spaces inverting and the dead coming back to life. All of this seemed impossible to portray in a live-action film, as live-action depictions of human dreams had been extremely limited; even David Lynch only played with tangram-like patchworks of reality and dreams within a single space.

And the stunning part of this film lay in the fact that the dreams Duke depicted could do whatever they wanted, freely overturning universally recognized laws of physics.

When the credits rolled, extremely enthusiastic applause erupted throughout the theater. Brad Pitt stood up and clapped, turning his head slightly to look back. The applause from the area arranged for the general audience was exceptionally loud, continuing for several minutes without any sign of stopping.

Unlike those complex films that ended up heavily neglected, Inception was highly welcomed by the audience.

Brad Pitt frowned slightly, but after just a few minutes of thought, he understood why.

Obviously, when Duke made this film, he wanted it to reach a wider audience as always, not just hardcore cinephiles. Therefore, the production was quite lavish. Besides inviting superstars of Leonardo DiCaprio and Charlize Theron's caliber, he deliberately incorporated the action-movie techniques he was so adept at. These seemingly cliché elements played a significant role in the film. They not only acted as a buffer for the mind-bending plot but also gave audiences accustomed to popcorn flicks a familiar sense of return, preventing them from losing their way in the relatively complex narrative.

As the applause gradually faded, Brad Pitt, like the other guests attending the Premiere, walked to the front row to offer his congratulations to the cast and crew.

"Duke, this is truly a fantastic film!"

He was speaking his true thoughts. This movie was very likely to be a massive hit; it was just a pity it didn't belong to his studio.

"I simply can't find the right adjectives to describe how I feel after watching it."

In terms of its commercial and narrative contributions, Inception was absolutely a rare gem of a film in recent years.

Leaving the Hollywood Chinese Theater, Brad Pitt marveled. Some "secondhand" concepts that Hollywood had long since used, once blended by Duke Rosenberg, erupted with breathtaking charm.

Among all the elements related to dreams in the film, what fascinated him the most was that the subjective flow of time in a dream differed from reality. A dream that ended hastily in physical time was stretched out through Duke Rosenberg's lens into a drawn-out dreamscape with no end in time and unbridled roaming in space, thereby creating thrilling dramatic tension.

"Duke's movies are just like this. The stories rarely possess the compassionate sentiments of a master, and even some of the ideas aren't original." Sitting in his car, Brad Pitt shook his head, yet a hint of admiration rested on his face. "But he always has a way of directing a story so it's packed with climax after climax."

The Premiere had ended, and more and more audience members walked out of the Hollywood Chinese Theater.

"Just what kind of movie is Inception?"

Quite a few viewers wore expressions of sheer disbelief as they walked out of the North American premiere of Inception.

Some had confusion written on their faces; some were thoughtfully pondering the movie's plot; some were exchanging opinions; and some looked as if a massive explosion had just gone off in their brains, the aftershocks still rippling as their excitement and shock had yet to fade.

Some felt exhilarated. This kind of exhilaration was not a sensory stimulation that could be manufactured solely by cold electronic buzzwords like CGI, IMAX, and 3D.

These people shared only one feeling: Duke Rosenberg had provided them with an unprecedented experience. Whether it was the visuals or the story, the thrill pierced through every nerve ending!

Some were left dizzy by it all. The massive amount of preset concepts, from Freud to Einstein; the multi-layered and multi-threaded narrative; every step was a maze, and every step held buried foreshadowing.

"Can you keep up with Duke's pace? Are you willing to nail yourself to your seat in a fixed posture, temporarily forgetting about popcorn, cola, the restroom, and the soft little hand of your girl? Or rather, is it really necessary to go this far to watch a movie?"

Many people harbored such doubts, but in the face of Inception and the name Duke Rosenberg, there was actually only one answer—it was absolutely necessary!

This was a movie Duke Rosenberg had made for smart people, and they all believed themselves to be smart enough!

"This sluggish and boring summer has finally welcomed its savior."

Walking among countless moviegoers, Norman Hiller watched the people around him excitedly discussing the plot of Inception and the various questions it raised. 'How long has it been since we had a collective carnival like this?' he marveled inwardly. 'Is Inception another The Dark Knight? No, it's even more complex and subversive than The Dark Knight.' Inception simply couldn't be defined or described. He couldn't find a template similar to it, except for the most revolutionary film of the last decade...

Yes, The Matrix! That trembling joy he had felt back then, as if witnessing the descent of a miracle, had returned.

Norman Hiller believed that before long, there would be countless people, countless forum posts, and countless sleepless nights dedicated solely to analyzing and discussing this movie frame by frame, just as they had once done with The Matrix.

Whether one liked it or not, whether one felt exhilarated, dizzy, or utterly dumbfounded by it, everyone had to admit one thing—Duke Rosenberg had brought a movie that truly belonged to this century, to this era!

"Get ready to watch it a second or third time!"

Amidst the crowd pouring out of the Hollywood Grand Theater, someone shouted this line, and the people around them nodded in agreement.