Monday, July 19, 2010

My review and ruminations about the Movie "Inception"

Hello all, first and foremost, thank you for taking the time to read this post.


Without further ado, I will begin on my thoughts about this movie.


Leonardo (Cobb) mentioned an interesting point about dreams.


"You always have the propensity to remember the middle part of the dream but you can never remember the beginning of it."


It's almost impossible to trace back where it emanates from. You have completely no idea as to how you get there in the first place. Enigmatic isn't it? No matter how hard you try to think, you can never guess it right.


The key here is that as long as the the beginning is obfurscated, the middle plot will seem real and the subconscious mind will accept it until the point in time where it can actuaully detect any pecularitiesi or things that are not in line with the subconscious's reality.


What do I mean by something not in line with the subconscious's reality? Well, it means that he knows that this is cleary impossible and cannot be done. For example, jumping out of a building and surviving after that without any pain.


It depends on the extent of the unusualness as well. The mind might be able to accept it initally but fortresses are slowly being set up as things get more and more peculiar.


Once you get pass the threshold of the subconscious's mind, it retaliates fiercely and the architect who sets up the dream will be attacked.


Since I'm a business student, I will like to relate this point to another point in the movie.


That is references and research. All these are done by this person called Arthur. He's the point man in the movie in charged of researching the team's target.


In business, it's the same thing. We do research about what our clients like and dislike. We don't dash straight into a meeting talking about things we want to say. Rather, we put across our points and aims in the way the clients want it to be.


We need to understand how they will respond to our presentations and also, we need to be able to penetrate through them.


What do I mean by that? We need to understand their concerns, their worries and what they are looking for; their criterias so to speak.


If you step into their comfort zone, they will be cool with you. However, once you triggered off their pain zone, something they hate to see, i.e. constant rattling about how good your product is and how they must buy it, they will be turned off immediately.


This is the same concern for the architect, which is the role of Ariadne (Ellen Page).


She has to construct a dream world to keep the subconscious's mind in loops and familiarity. She must not create something that allows him to be able to discern what's real and what's not.


It must be an environment so smooth and calming that the subconscious's mind will not be offended or disturbed.


This is like business. You have to create an environment that allows your clients to comfortably express their concerns. Give them a chance to speak up and also you have to lead them to your door.


Test the water with a few questions and try to identify their concerns. Do not assume for you are only going to make an ass out of yourself.


Identify the emotion changes on their face along the way and how they respond. They all play a part in telling you how they actually feel about your presentations.


This of course comes with experience. It is not a one-time pony trick. You need to go through tonnes of practices before you can become a veteran at identifying their concerns in a glance.


Typically, sales person will just keep going and going on their own without giving a damn about what their clients are thinking about.


Before they know it, they are already not listening anymore.


This dream thingy taught me that it is extremely pivotal to create an environment where your clients are comfortable in. Where they are able to be themselves and in turn, switch off all their defences and leak out their vulnerable side so that you can attack it.


When they let it out, you can start to relate to them. Better still, they will start to speak up on their own. From then on, you just have to be a good listener and listen to understand. Let them talk and take note of every single details they say for they are what made up their personalities and of course, their concerns.


Once he feels insecure or intruded, his subconscious will stare at you and barriers will be set up and you will be killed.


Then the presentation ends.


That's briefly what I feel about the point whereby you have to create an environment to keep the subconscious in loops for as long as possible to circumvent capture.


Up next, I will be talking about another in the movie, actually it's de facto the epitome of the movie per se, "Ideas".


See you tomorrow !

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