Cinematography and Story Telling in Inception

 After watching the ending once more and analyzing it, I am amazed by the cinematography that Wally Pfister produced in Christopher Nolan's Inception. He uses a variety of shots and angles to deepen the meaning of the story. 

In the order of how the scene goes, the first shot is an extreme close-up of Mr. Cobb. This contributes to the story because, paired with the confusion and emotion in his eyes, it shows how surprised he is to be awake, as if it were a miracle. Both Cobb and Saito were in the final level of the dream world, or limbo, for many years, both physically becoming old. Waking up in the real world just hours after they started dreaming was unexpected and took them a second to realize what was going on. The camera does a dolly effect to shift the focus to the rest of the people around him. The camera pans to show the different characters to share their reactions to him being awake. Fischer has almost no reaction because he was the victim of their 'inception' plan. However, when the camera pans from Arthur to Ariadne, he seems glad while she, at first, is surprised then also becomes glad. The camera cuts back and forth between Cobb and Saito to show their reactions, when you see Saito realize what has happened and immediately whip out his phone to make his promised phone call. Their eyes tell a story by themselves using emotion.

When they get off the plane, shallow focus is used with a wide/mid shot to single out Cobb in the crowd of people at the airport. This allows the viewer to focus on Cobb only, emphasizing how alone he currently is despite being in a room full of people. When talking to the worker, high and low angle over the shoulder shots are used to show the interaction between them as well as POV shots of the passport. This shows the separation between them in level of significance to the story as the worker will never be seen ever again. A focus pull and a dolly are used to shift the focus from the airport worker to Ariadne as a final goodbye without saying anything. The other significant characters from the plane can be seen while Cobb makes his way to his Father in law with a shallow focus. They are out of focus until it shows Fischer, which is not a symbol of goodbye, but more of a "do I know you?" reaction, displaying confusion of Fischer's face as the clueless one. This can be seen as a tracking shot, following Cobb around the airport, when he is finally met with his Father in law. There is another focus pull from Cobb to the Father in law to display his as another significant character. 

When they finally get to the house, the camera tilts downward to show the spinning of the top, as Cobb tries to figure out if he is still dreaming. The camera is zoomed in on the kids when they finally, for the first time in the movie, look back at him. The master/long shot shows him hugging his kids and the camera does another focus shift and pan over to the top that is still spinning. The camera zooms in, shifting the focus completely to the top, which is the symbol or totem that helps Cobb determine if he is still dreaming or not. If the top continues to spin forever, he is dreaming; if it stops, he may not be dreaming. This is very significant because the camera cuts off right as it appears to wobble, leaving the viewer unsure whether Cobb truly returned to reality or not. 

With this, it is obvious why Pfister won the Academy Award for best cinematographer. The story was elevated to another level due to his amazing camera work. If more simple cinematography was used, this scene would have needed a lot more dialogue and would not have been as effective and emotionally powerful. The lack of dialogue throughout this scene was a power move and worked really well due to the storytelling of the camera work. 

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