‘I’d rate it a 9 out of 10’: A dream expert gives his take on Inception

Directed by Christopher Nolan in 2010, the breathtaking Inception cleverly combines the worlds of dreams and science fiction, offering viewers a thrilling dreamlike heist directed by Leonardo DiCaprio.

As dream stealer Dom Cobb, his mission was to penetrate the subconscious mind of an important businessman in order to implant a very specific idea. Spectacular and ingenious, Nolan’s film was a unique journey into the depths of the human mind, skillfully juggling multiple, rather specialized concepts.

• It’s one of the great mysteries of cinema: does the top stop spinning at the beginning at the end?

But how scientifically accurate and realistic is Inception? Neurosurgeon and dream expert Rahul Jandial spoke about this topic recently In an interview for Penguin Books UK. Agreeing to analyze certain sequences from Nolan’s film (and especially the one in which Dom Cobb explains how dreams work to Ariana), the specialist came to the conclusion that Inception was very close to reality:

“Right on target.”

“You’re great”he said, commenting on Leonardo DiCaprio’s famous scene.

“sometimes It almost creates itself. This is very important, we don’t need to activate dreams for dreams, and the stimulus is independent, which means we don’t need to activate it. Dreams happen, they happen regardless of our intentions, so It hits the nail on the head.”

The scientist also confirmed the character’s words that in dreams we are our own architects:

“That’s absolutely correct. When we dream, we create our dreamscape. The motor and visual areas of our brain are active, it’s not just fantasy. It’s caused by neuronal activity, so waking thoughts and dreaming thoughts are stimulated. Brain I really like what they’re saying here .”

9 out of 10

At the end of the analysis, Rahul Jandial gave Nolan’s film a very good rating, as well as an excellent score:

“It’s not bad, there are a lot of complicated concepts about dreams, and most of them are correct. (…) If I had to rate it on a scale of 0 to 10, knowing that 10 is the most accurate film, I would give it a generous 9 out of 10.”

So know when you re-watch Inception that Christopher Nolan did his homework very well before filming it.

(Re)discover all the hidden details of the movie…