Kick Me: Why Inception's Complexity Is So Unnecessary

I don't like my first review of Inception. I had nagging gripes with the movie the first time I saw it, but I couldn't nail them down. So, I saw it again, and I now wish to clarify what I find so frustrating about the film. Again, it must be said that Inception is not bad. It contains some fascinating ideas and thrilling moments. (If you don't want any of those moments spoiled, stick with my first review. This one will assume you've seen the movie and more or less grasp its plot.) Nevertheless, aspects of the film drive me nuts, and I have not been able to satisfyingly explain why until now.

Someone should sit through this movie with a stopwatch and determine exactly how much of the running time is devoted to explaining stuff. Textbook screenwriting says that your characters should verbally explain things as rarely as possible (meaning, as much should be shown as possible – this isn't radio!), and when your characters absolutely must be explaining things, you should camouflage it. Inception's main tool for camouflage is the old "we have a new recruit" trick. Cobb dumping info on Ariadne is tolerable for the early moments of the film because she's wet behind the ears, but stuff is still getting explained to her two thirds of the way into the film and, in the last third, Ariadne jumps in and starts explaining stuff herself. ("Wait! We can jump down into limbo and then Kick X will knock us into Level C, bringing Character P back to life... homefry!") The relentless barrage of information is not particularly involving. It's more headache-inducing than anything else.

Technically speaking, this isn't great writing, but whatever best serves the story, right? Thing is, I cannot figure out what this babbling adds to our experience. The consensus seems to be that Inception is about Cobb's journey toward realizing that existence is what you make of it – that whether you're dreaming or awake isn't terribly important. If this is the core of the film, all of this exposition only serves the film by showing that, in searching for reality, Cobb is making his life more complicated than it needs to be. So, yes, Cobb's plans should be complicated. Yet 90% of the explaining in this film is not devoted to Cobb's plans; most of it is devoted to the fundamentals of dream navigation. In other words, all of these complicated rules are only there because Christopher Nolan purposelessly made them up.

At the moment, the ability to follow Inception's plot seems to be our popular culture's litmus test for basic intelligence, but, since little of the film's complexity contributes to its ultimate meaning, this movie is not as intellectually engaging as it may seem. Cobb and Mal could have gone into one layer of one dream, gotten lost in the recesses of their own minds, and she could have been driven mad right then and there. There is no need for dozens of arbitrary rules to tell this story; they are needless mental busywork.

Not only would paring things down rid the film of tons of exposition, but it would create room for the characters to experience things together. This would allow the film to explore how these characters lost their grip on reality and why it happened. As the film is, what do we actually see Mal and Cobb do together? They briefly gawk at all of the buildings they made and then they take a train to the face. It conveys the events that took place, yes, but does it demand that we grapple with them?

I think this detached, clinical approach seriously harms the scenes following Mal and Cobb's return to (supposed) reality. We see her ignoring the kids and screaming at Cobb. These moments are obviously charged with emotion, and seem to be the most human way to convey the damage dream-hopping does. Yet we are not allowed to feel any of the emotion from these scenes because they are being conveyed through Cobb's narration.

Relegating such scenes to short flashbacks is presumably used as a way to speed things along so we can get back to the heist plot line. Even this side of the story, however, is not told in the most effective manner. Inception really wants to be a heist movie, but it does not properly execute the most fundamental heist movie device: Show us the plan so we know what can (and will) go wrong. Inception never really shows us the plan. It spends tons of time explaining the metaphysical context for the plan and the tools for manipulating this context (levels, kicks, architecture, etc.), but it never provides sufficient detail about who's going to do what and why. So, when the plan rolls into action and immediately falls apart, Nolan is wasting his time. We don't care because we didn't know what was supposed to happen. Then, the rest of the movie is a mix of improvisation and the original plan, meaning that the audience continues to be stuck trying to understand what the plan is, never getting a moment to react to what's happening. There is no room for investment on the audience's part. This is only storytelling in the most literal sense.

All of the misfiring heist movie mechanics also trample over the only remotely important characters: Mal and Cobb. Strangling the depth out of all of the characters is an impressive achievement for a film that mostly takes place within their minds.

Nolan's misuse of dreams, after all, is Inception's greatest problem. The lynchpin of every plan Cobb makes is avoiding "unconstructed dreamspace." He does this by using architects like Ariadne to make sandboxes within which Cobb and his team can safely play. The failure of one of those sandboxes is the worst thing that can possibly happen and, yet, it never does; the device with the greatest potential for drama is never utilized. No character ever wanders out of a building and into a void, and no collapsing dream ever reveals some untold anarchy beyond its bounds. Even when Nolan takes us into the limbo level – which, by his own description, is largely composed of "unconstructed dreamspace" – he goes against all likelihood and throws the characters into two pieces of constructed real estate.

This gutless move deprives the audience of the story's greatest potential spectacle and its best opportunity to explore the characters' minds. The bland mountain base shootout was painful to watch because I knew every moment we spent watching it was a moment we could have spent watching a cross between the film's hallway fight and the final act of 2001: A Space Odyssey. The film does broach the potential for dreams' character development when Ariadne sneaks her way into Cobb's dream, but even that fairly intense sequence had only a fraction of the raw emotion we could have experienced if we had entered Cobb's unconstructed subconscious.

Such scenes would necessitate a bit of abstraction, but that is exactly what Inception lacks. Dreams are abstract, but Nolan insists on trying to reduce them to tangible, practical chunks. It's an impossible task and Nolan's failure to complete it renders this a cluttered, breathless film. The irony is that something much simpler could have yielded far more depth.

If You're Going to Dream, Dream Big

In spite of its travels to the depths of the human mind, Inception may be most interesting as an expression of the limits of Christopher Nolan's ambition. His film is by no means a failure, but it balks at taking big risks; Inception rarely feels like the unfettered roller coaster that it should be. Instead, it is a neat film – one that mostly challenges on the superficial level of plot and hesitates to unsettle the audience on a more meaningful level.

The premise, however, is irresistible. Dominic Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) is an extractor. He, along with his team, enters people's dreams and steals their ideas. Saito (Ken Watanabe), a businessman, approaches him with a unique challenge: He wants Cobb to plant an idea in a competitor's head. The process, known as "inception," is largely untested and very risky. Nolan's script spends roughly the first hour of the movie establishing these risks and the complexities that go into mitigating them. It makes these early minutes slower than one would expect, but it's necessary; when the shit heads for the fan, it's much more fun if we know what's at stake.

Whether it be extraction or inception, Cobb's plans are meticulous. For example, the dream world that the thieves enter is never that of the victim. Instead, one of the thieves constructs a dream world in his or her own mind, then the victim is slipped into it. It ensures that the situation is as tightly controlled as possible. The variable? The imagined people inhabiting the dream are created by the person entering it. This means that your average heist must be pulled off in a setting filled with projections of the victim's subconscious – crowds of people keeping a suspicious eye on foreigners at all times.

Cobb brings a problem of his own into the equation: He's a little hung up on his dead wife, Mal (Marion Cotillard). As a result, she occasionally pries her way into a dream and wreaks havoc. Cobb's baggage is ostensibly the core of the movie. Nolan works hard to give the film a strong emotional thread, but it never quite resonates; Mal's scenes are often intense, but never moving. This is likely due to Cobb's impenetrable, sullen attitude. (Yet even the great supporting actors struggle to achieve some sort of presence amid all of the plot machinery.)

Mal serves the film a bit better on a plot level. With Cobb's plans keeping the dreams as tame as possible, she is the wildcard that is guaranteed to make things interesting. The moment Saito's heist begins, she delivers. I don't wish to spoil anything, but the action sequence that ensues makes surprising and harrowing use of a freight train, and it fully benefits from Nolan's disdain for computer-generated fakery. For the most part, however, Mal is content to simply tease Cobb.

Likewise, the main heist (which takes up the back hour and a half) tends to play out more through tense dialogue than surreal visuals. By the time Cobb & Co. have ventured into a dream within a dream within a dream, this has begun to ring false. How can a journey into the sub-sub-subconscious play out so smoothly? Maybe this is just me, but I always envisioned my subconscious as a circus of id-fueled madness. Sure, it makes sense that Cobb would try to control it, but I figured complete failure was inevitable. Things certainly go wrong, and Cobb's story reveals greater complexities during the course of the movie, but the dreamscapes never fully unhinge – they never quite feel dreamlike.

That's where this movie pisses me off.

That amazing shot of Paris folding over itself (heavily featured in trailers) is shortly followed by Cobb's admonishment. Manipulating the scenery in such a way is too flashy, he tells Ariadane (Ellen Page), the latest recruit to his team. Cobb would say this; he's running from his subconscious. But Nolan? Why does he seem to feel the same way? One of the deepest dream levels comes in the form of a bland mountain base shootout – for no good reason – and the film's climax takes place in Cobb's old house, in the midst of a decrepit city. It's slightly surreal but, at this point, we're four dreams deep, in an unplanned face-off with his darkest fears. It's downright lame that the setting is anything short of a mindfuck. What happened? It's not like the budget was running short.

Nolan's execution of his ideas is not a complete letdown thanks to a few strong sequences. The aforementioned training sequence with Cobb and Ariadane is quite fun. She serves as the audience's proxy for most of the movie and the role pays off in this scene. She runs through a city, manipulating every structure conceivable – a brief moment where whimsy overcomes the film's portentousness.

The other highlight is an excellent action scene. Joseph Gordon-Levitt (who is otherwise criminally underused) has to fight off a few guards in a hallway. Thing is, outside of the dream he is in, he is strapped into a tumbling van. The turning feeling has a direct impact on his experience in the dream. So, he must scamper up walls and and across ceilings as the hallway spins around him. The sequence is almost lyrical as it cuts between Gordon-Levitt scrambling to stay upright and slow-motion images of his unconscious body swaying inside the vehicle.

That scene, as well as the zero-gravity scenes that follow, is a marvel of special effects. I have absolutely no idea how Nolan and his team achieved these effects and, frankly, I do not want to know. Especially when one studies film, moments of genuine movie magic become very rare. This film provides a few such moments.

But, god damnit, those moments are just too few and far between to elevate Inception to greatness. Other than a devilish cutaway at the very end that leaves one major question unanswered, Inception leaves little of consequence to ponder. Nolan seems unable or unwilling to fully explore his biggest ideas; they are, instead, confined to the conceptual stage. Consequently, what could have been a landmark sci-fi epic is little more than a solid thriller.

The Inception That Proves the Rule

Inception is not Christopher Nolan's best film, but it may be the most representative film he has yet directed, a summation of his career thus far. With its twisty plot, its awe-inspiring visions, and its ambiguity, it seems the quintessential Christopher Nolan film. It's a shame that it also suffers from Nolan's few, but vexing, bad habits.

(I'll try and avoid explicit spoilers, but some plot twists will be implicit in my review.)

Inception is Nolan's most "high concept" film yet, a mixture of crime drama, thriller, science fiction, and psychological study. The film's title refers to the feat of entering a person's mind, manipulating their dreams, and planting a new, potentially all-consuming, idea. Unfortunately for our protagonists – I'm loathe to call them heroes – inception is nigh-impossible to pull off, and its practitioners run the risk of losing themselves in their own minds.

Nolan manages to make the plot of Inception plausible, and there may rest his greatest triumph in the film. The infiltration and manufacture of dreams are, of course, utterly fantastic ideas. Yet by showing how it's done in his world – and by having his characters raise objection to the concept – he successfully coaxes the audience past their disbelief. Based off my first viewing, the rules of the dream world are internally consistent; we understand (more or less) the dream technology and its limitations. Nolan's dreams have more rules and regulations than do our dreams; there's no gap for deus ex machinae to come through.

Inception's surprisingly wide-ranging plots allows Nolan to introduce a number of themes and motifs from his earlier work. As with Memento and The Prestige, the new movie begins near the story's chronological end. The relationship between the "hero" Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his wife Mal (Marion Cotillard) seems a direct lift from Memento. One can take the central dream caper as an expanded and deepened take on the Joker's bank robbery in The Dark Knight, while the extended planning scenes bring to mind The Prestige's interest in process and preparation. Ellen Page's Ariadne has an obviously symbolic name, just Al Pacino's Dormer did in Insomnia. The ending too reminds me of earlier Nolan films; more than that I shall not say.

Ever since Batman Begins, Christopher Nolan has had the reputation of being a bad director of action scenes, though I think several of The Dark Knight's sequences are brilliant. The action and chase pieces of Inception, however, suffers from poor choreography and planning. One dream sequence involves a gun fight in a crowded city, yet it's very difficult to determine who's who and who we ought be rooting for. A later sequence in a snow field has similar problems: heroes and "villains" dress so similarly as to make identification impossible. At least you could tell Batman and the Joker apart. The dream sequences don't lack for visual interest, but the most compelling dreams – folding and mirrored cities, M.C. Escher staircases, the dark heart of Cobb's subconscious – all seem to occur within the first hour of the film. With all the gunplay and explosions, there's precious little room for beauty.

While Inception has a large cast of big names, I was rather surprised at how little screen time certain actors get. Michael Caine in particular felt underused, having at most five minutes of screen time in a two hour movie; his role seems little more than a charming cameo. Though the story belongs to Cobb, Mal, and Ariadne, I was generally impressed by Nolan's efforts in fleshing out the minor characters. Ken Watanabe and Cillian Murphy, who held small roles in previous Nolan films, both acquit themselves well of their increased screen time.

I was hoping that I would love Inception as much as I do The Dark Knight, that the film would be a science fiction masterpiece. The new movie isn't as good as The Dark Knight, but I think it's one of Nolan's better films, and hardly a misstep for the director. It's beautiful and surprising, but the pacing and some of the extended action scenes really damage the film's impact. Inception may not the best film in Nolan's fine career, but I'm already looking forward to rewatching it.

The Most Expensive "Smurfs" Reboot Yet

Did you see Titanic? Of course you did. Years later, do you look back on it with particular fondness? I doubt it. When you join the rest of the world in shelling out $11.50 to see Avatar, you are signing up for a very similar deal.

James Cameron's latest siege on Hollywood's bank accounts, after all, is about as shallow as a movie experience can get. Despite being heralded as "revolutionary," Avatar is really a $300 million coat of paint on a story that is so ancient it would have bored nineteenth century audiences. The highest praise that can be bestowed on the film is that every dollar spent shows on screen (apart from the $150 million Fox spent on marketing, that is). It makes Avatar a decent spectacle, but only in the most fleeting way, as not one facet of this movie is emotional, thought-provoking or innovative enough to remain in the viewer's mind long after viewing.

When Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) takes the first push out of his cryogenic casket and floats into the huge spaceship surrounding it, the audience in the theater will likely let out a few gasps from behind their 3D glasses. This is with good reason, too – the shot is stunning, as it reveals a bustling, immersive world of technology. What is truly stunning, however, is how quickly that sense of awe wanes. This, a film that was supposed to be the best argument for the return of 3D yet, exposes the technology as an absolute gimmick.

Avatar's first couple of shots set the expectation that the entire film will be this impressive when, in reality, only a few shots in every scene display considerable dimensionality. The audience is left searching for these shots, being disappointed when they fail to appear and distracted when they do appear. Of course, making every shot conspicuously 3D would have been equally distracting. I have only seen two films in 3D (Coraline was much better, by the way), but I am already convinced that the technology is useless outside of theme parks.

Granted, the film can always be seen in good ol' 2D. Besides, the distractions of 3D would not really matter if the visuals stood up well on their own. The quality of Avatar's art design is debatable. The human military base that figures heavily into the early scenes makes for the least interesting visuals of the film – stealing its metal-on-metal aesthetic from countless recent video games, such as Gears of War and Killzone. The natural settings of the planet, Pandora, are far more diverse and certainly display a certain beauty. I would stop short of calling its design original, as much of it looks like Ferngully by way of Roland Emmerich, but Cameron's art department clearly made it all as pretty as they could, even if they did not make it terribly interesting.

Populating this environment is the Na'vi, a race of big, blue, bipedal creatures and easily the film's greatest achievement. While Avatar's motion capture work may not be as earth-shattering as advertised (Seriously, have some people not seen a video game in the past ten years, or The Lord of the Rings?), this film easily achieves a level of quality not previously seen with the technology. The computer-generated creatures convey performances from Worthington and company with striking nuance and, had the script called for it, would have communicated considerable emotion.

Cameron obviously sank a lot of time into conceptualizing the visuals and their accompanying technology. Perhaps, then, it will be surprising to hear that his directing is nothing special. Action sequences play out with considerable scale, but they never quite thrill. Nothing so harrowing as T-1000 clawing his way up the back of a moving car in Terminator 2 or even the tipping deck of the Titanic is to be found in Avatar. Cameron certainly does not do much between action scenes, either, mainly flaunting the scenery and carefully maintaining the mystery of whether or not the female Na'vi have nipples.

Naturally, the action scenes would have enjoyed more dramatic weight had they been aided by a decent script. That a 160 minute film, fifteen years in the making can be so horribly underwrought is a sad irony. Main "character" Jake Sully is really just the weight that drags the plot forward – not that it is much of a plot to begin with. Briefly: Boy is hired to spy on natives. Boy infiltrates natives. Boy beds girl native. Boy changes sides. Boy fights against civilized folk. It is all so predictable that Cameron even seems bored with it. What should be a major plot point – boy changing sides – is never even shown on screen. Instead, we see him feeding intel to the human military over many weeks then, after some dicking around with his inevitable love interest, he is suddenly warning the Na'vi that they will be exterminated in a matter of minutes.

The aforementioned love interest – Neytiri (Zoe Saldana) – also jerks through her development, disapproving and cold one moment, then hopping into Jake's lap and proclaiming her love the next. There are, of course, stoic elders on one side and a battle-hardened military man on the other, but these characters are written and performed with such incredible banality that their presence drags the movie into tedium. Even the champion of the middle ground, Dr. Augustine (Sigourney Weaver), who is initially quite promising, never gets a chance to do anything more than smoke and complain.

The greatest irony of Avatar, however, is not its shallowness. It is that a film produced with such modern techniques can be so woefully archaic in its ideas. The concept of the "noble savage" is one that was already being mocked back in Charles Dickens' time. That James Cameron sees fit to lecture us spoiled ignoramuses with a story about simple natives and their untainted wisdom is laughable. The hypocrisy of the concept is totally lost on him, as he casually mashes Native American spirituality together with Hinduism, and has it all performed by black actors, portraying them as a patently undeveloped society and then telling us that they are righteous, even after they slaughter hordes of human soldiers.

There are a few interesting concepts raised by this script, such as a natural internet linking all of the living things on Pandora and Jake's fading sense of identity as he moves between the two races, but very little is done with these ideas. They are quickly abandoned for the more predictable aspects of the plot, and they create innumerable plot holes, anyway. (The Na'vi can see the future by way of their ancestors and this internet. Was their connection down when they were supposed to be informed of their impending slaughter? ...I could list many more, but I will refrain.)

Avatar never manages to be as socially irresponsible as Transformers 2 was and it does not exist solely to sell a sequel, like Star Trek did. It is apparent that Cameron still wishes to entertain the audience, so it is difficult to hate him for this film. Still, his naive ideas, absurd budget and obsession with digital effects do a great deal to undercut this film's entertainment value. This is simply not the James Cameron that brought us the gritty, character-driven brilliance of The Terminator. Like the millions of dollars Fox spent on the film, as well as the income moviegoers are providing in return, it is all so very, very disposable.

Flashbacks, Flashforwards and Flashes of Cleavage

Now that Dollhouse has been sent to the attic, the options for sci-fi fans who watch network television are fewer than ever. Even Fringe, the only other sci-fi show that Fox has, spent some time on the chopping block. Surprisingly, it seems that ABC is looking to fill this void. This September, one of the network's major premieres was a show called FlashForward. Now, in the thick of November sweeps, ABC has pulled out another big-budget, sci-fi project: V. It places ABC in the unlikely position of being sci-fi's last network television hope. (Cable is not looking much better.) So, should sci-fi fans place their hopes in the network best known for Dancing with the Stars and Grey's Anatomy?

Immediately, it is clear that ABC's concept of what sci-fi can be is defined with one word: Lost. (If we ignore Defying Gravity, which we certainly will.) Both FlashForward and V obviously borrow their general formulas from J.J. Abrams' popular show. For those of you who do not have electricity, Lost is about a group of people who are stranded on a remote, Pacific island after their plane mysteriously crashes. The crash occurs in the first episode and, from that point on, we watch as the passengers slowly piece together what happened to them, both through scenes on the island and through flashbacks.

Now, FlashForward is a show where, instead of flashbacks, the characters must grapple with (wait for it) flashforwards. The central mystery here is why everyone in the world saw two minutes and seventeen seconds of what could very well be their future. On paper, it is essentially Lost, but the people can shave and buy a hamburger whenever they want.

V is not quite so overtly derivative. Alien spaceships appear over a number of major cities around the world, equipped with giant LCD screens. The aliens use these screens to ensure the humans that they are "of peace. Always." Moral complexity ostensibly ensues as the ensemble of characters struggles to figure out just what the aliens intend to do. To the credit of creator, Kenneth Johnson, V leaves the plot's timeline largely un-screwed with. Yet, V still largely focuses on how the numerous characters react to the circumstances, like the other two shows and, like FlashForward, V even does this in the face of a very large-scale premise. I am not, by any means, saying that sci-fi cannot be character-driven. The problem with these two shows is that the character development seems to enable a phobia of genuine science fiction among their producers.

FlashForward actually did quite a bit with its premise over its first few episodes. The writers quickly set about exploring the endless repercussions of a global catastrophe, from the immediate chaos that results from everyone passing out for two minutes to the twisted playground games children play once school resumes. Furthermore, the numerous characters in the show are each affected by unique problems arising from their glimpses into the future. One character sees himself speaking to his dead daughter, another sees herself cheating on her husband and one even sees nothing at all. It results in some protracted melodrama, yes, but quite a bit of genuine pathos, as well.

Yet, the fact remains that the major hook in FlashForward is an epic, sci-fi mystery. It is in the execution of this aspect that the show falls on its face. I groaned the moment I learned that the lead character is an FBI agent and my reaction has proven justified. Much of the show is devoted to procedural water-treading, as the agent and his cohorts run from one contrived clue to another, struggling to understand the flashforwards. It renders the show a thinly veiled cop drama. This show's writers may be smart, but they shot themselves in the foot; FlashForward's hook is far more exciting than anything the show can offer on a weekly basis. The saving grace? The flashforwards all showed what would happen on a certain day in spring, 2010, meaning that the show has a guaranteed payoff by the end of the season. It is hard to deny that such a commitment took guts on the writers' part.

V, on the other hand, has no saving grace. By the end of the 47 minute pilot episode, there is little question that this show is DOA. It begins much like FlashForward, showing the large cast of characters being caught off guard by a shocking incident. Thing is, this show's "shocking incident" is a vaguely creepy lady on a TV screen. What V's writers wish to do with their concept (or the concept they stole from the 1980's series by the same name) is largely unclear. Sure, there are characters running around, getting agitated for various reasons, but this show has no themes to tie the rambling plot together.

It is immediately obvious that the aliens are up to no good, so the controversy among the humans as to the aliens' motives seems downright idiotic. There are a few good aliens, but it is tough to care about their subversive efforts because we have no idea what, exactly, makes the bad aliens bad, apart from their hair. Much of the first two episodes is devoted to a teenage character's attempts to bed a sexy alien girl who often fails to fully zip up her top. Finally, (did you see this coming?) the main character is an FBI agent who is struggling to uncover the true nature of the aliens by way of a series of vague clues. So much time is devoted to the trifling exploits of these flat characters that the science fiction is often limited to the occasional shot of the space ship over Manhattan.

Circumstances are neither mitigated by the often laughable dialogue, (Teenage guy's sidekick goes, "Two words: Awe-some!" when he gets hit on. An interrogation scene begins with the line, "I want answers!") nor by the hokey production design that uses stock TV apartments and FBI offices that are shot with about as much menace as an episode of Private Practice. V may not rely on the storytelling gimmicks that ABC's other two sci-fi dramas do, but it is victimized by many of the same pitfalls, and to a far greater extent. It is impressive how bland and familiar a show featuring reptile people can feel.

While ABC's narrow approach to sci-fi does not completely undermine their efforts, it is undeniable that, by the time they got around to airing V, the well had run dry. If the network wants to be science fiction's savior, it is going to have to take some chances. FlashForward may yet prove worthwhile, but V has no chance of doing so. Considering that both of the shows' ratings are sinking, however, neither may have a future. Is it too early to ask what Joss Whedon is working on next?

Are You Ready for Your Treatment?

The Dollhouse offers a service. For a certain amount of money, you can have the exact person you want – the exact person you need – instantly. Do not think of it as a fantasy, however, because a doll does not act; a doll is a genuine, complete human being, designed to your specifications, temporarily at your service.

That is the sales pitch, anyway.

What goes on behind the scenes, in order to make all of this possible, is what concerns "Dollhouse," the Fox TV series that premiered this past February. The dolls are, indeed, real people. They are people who, for one reason or another, wanted to disappear. In return for guarantees of no long-term harm, no memories of it all and a large sum of cash, they give up their bodies for a period of five years. During this time, they reside in the Dollhouse, awaiting assignments, or "engagements," in a blissful state of submission – the tabula rasa, if you will. When called up, a doll is imbued with a personality (usually a composite of real personalities, designed to suit the needs of the assignment) and sent out under the surveillance of his or her handler.

You may find the concept of the Dollhouse to be disturbing, fascinating or, even, both. Its moral and ethical implications are vast and complex. Thankfully, the minds behind "Dollhouse," led by "Buffy" creator, Joss Whedon, are up to the task of exploring these complexities while keeping the show exciting and engrossing. This is simply some of the best writing on TV right now (and it happens to be aided by an excellent cast and strong crew).

This is largely due to scripts that consistently raise the show's premise to new heights. The series' first few chapters are largely episodic, focusing on one engagement per episode, as performed by a doll named Echo (Eliza Dushku). Over the course of these few episodes, however, some central concepts are introduced: Echo is growing in ways the Dollhouse did not intend (namely, she is retaining information, even after the compulsory post-engagement wipe); the technology is not as solid as the Dollhouse's staff would like to think.

These early episodes also display the diversity of jobs the dolls must do, ranging from romantic encounters to hostage negotiations to backup singing. Through all of these encounters, we discover the wide range of perspectives clients have on the service they use and the vast potential for danger that it brings. As the show develops, however, it becomes less concerned with external workings of the Dollhouse and concentrates on the dolls and those working there. Here is where the show begins to flourish.

It is precisely because "Dollhouse" is so concerned with the human cost of the technology that it succeeds. Each character is actively struggling with their role in the use of a technology that could very well prove to be apocalyptic but, for now, is used for a vaguely consenting form of slavery. Accordingly, they each have their own doubts, motivations and ethics. Echo's handler, Boyd Langton (Harry Lennix) believes the Dollhouse is abhorrent, but he has a genuine concern for Echo that is, at once, moving and confounding, as she has no consistent persona with which he can develop a relationship. Adelle DeWitt (Olivia Williams) is in charge of the Dollhouse. She views everything as a business transaction – something that proves to be a surprising source of compassion, as she insists on treating the dolls well, as per their contracts. Topher Brink (Fran Kranz), the smug scientist who is solely responsible for the Dollhouse's vital technological component, sees himself as a philanthropist.

There are nearly a dozen other characters in "Dollhouse" that have equally valid justifications for why the hate, love or simply tolerate the Dollhouse. Not the least of these characters are the dolls themselves, who slowly grow over the course of the season, proving that there is no such thing as a blank slate. You see, after thirteen episodes, Whedon and his writers have proven that they intend to leave no stone unturned in this valley of potential ideas. This is a rare case where calling a show "high concept" is praise of the highest order. Never resorting to convolution for the sake of itself, this story unfolds like a blooming flower, revealing a new world of potential with every episode.

It is likely that you have not heard much about "Dollhouse." The ignorance of television critics, the ineptitude of Fox's management and a vocal crowd of internet detractors have all conspired to make sure that this show is rarely evaluated on its own merits – if ever evaluated at all. Push your way past the din, however, and you will find that "Dollhouse" is network television's best kept secret.

The show's second season premieres on Fox at nine on Friday, September 25th. This allows more than enough time to get caught up on the series, available on DVD, Blu-Ray and digital download. The first season's final five episodes are also available on Hulu for free, providing a decent jumping-on point. Otherwise, Joss Whedon assures viewers that the second season premiere will be accessible to new viewers.

In "District 9," Two Is a Crowd

Oh, "District 9," how I loved you. Yet, you had to go and burn me... or make me pop like a sack of meat with a firecracker inside of it.

It was hard to ignore that first, cryptic trailer that came out a few months ago. The film simply looked like nothing else, with its ripped-from-a-news-broadcast footage of South Africa and the ominous spacecraft hovering, cemented in the skies above the city. A later trailer revealed that the film featured some action, but still left most of it shrouded in mystery. "District 9" is the brain child of first-time writer/director Neill Blomkamp, a protégé of Peter Jackson. Blomkamp, unlike his mentor, knows how to keep his running times in check. Unfortunately, it only takes his film about 30 minutes to more or less abandon everything it aspires to be.

Those first thirty minutes, though, are fascinating. Twenty years prior to the start of the film, a massive alien spacecraft parked itself over Johannesburg, then did nothing. The mysterious inactivity persisted for so long that government forces actually broke into the ship. Inside, they found countless, dying aliens. In an effort that walked the line between self-preservation and charity, the humans relocated the aliens to a slum outside of the city – District 9. The result, years later, is a strikingly familiar portrait of a race that has been segregated, alienated and forced into desperation. The humans, by and large, fear the aliens. While they are a wellspring of controversy among the humans, the aliens have been afforded few rights or dignities. Now, a private organization, Multinational United, has been hired to relocate the aliens to the promisingly-titled District 10.

"District 9," at first, is essentially a documentary. Blomkamp provides all of this background information through interviews with fictional experts and witnesses, and brilliant use of existing news footage. Obviously, there are special effects added to this footage, but their execution is seamless and presented with such believable context that they truly look as if they are taken from tomorrow night's news. Within this unnamed documentary, the film's premise gains an astonishing amount of relevance.

MNU does not evict the aliens from their homes in District 9 with brute force, but with an all-too-familiar mix of bureaucracy and military intimidation. We watch these evictions take place through on-the-scene camera crews hired by MNU, as they follow the project leader, Wikus Van De Merwe (played by the fairly talented unknown, Sharlto Copley). Hired by way of nepotism, he seems barely equipped for the job. Yet, his role is far more complex than this. He seems to be the only man who understands the alien language or has any considerable familiarity with District 9. He sometimes uses this knowledge to defuse tensions between the bewildered aliens and the tense military force. Other times, however, he openly manipulates the aliens, forcing them to sign forms that consent to eviction. The footage is downright fascinating, as the aliens become incredibly sympathetic, if only through the humans' methodical mistreatment of them.

As the film nears the half-hour mark, however, hiccups appear. Suddenly, we are following aliens, as they attempt to build a device. Are cameras following these aliens? How would that be possible? It is not; the documentary footage tapers away from this point, forward. The film is abruptly shifting into a completely different storytelling medium – a dramatic one. With this shift, all of the striking immediacy and unsettling relevance that comes with the documentary form wilts. The audience is left to hastily adjust its expectations of the film. This is no longer a story told in facts, on a grand scale. It is now something far more commonplace – a personal story – a fictional drama.

The rest of the film plays out as Van De Merwe is exposed to the device said aliens were creating. It affects him profoundly, and leads him to drastically reconsider his relationship with the aliens. The film's final act, having completely abandoned the subtle realism of the first act, is a bombastic action film. It becomes riddled with gory violence (alien weapons tend to pop humans... yes, pop them) and all of the depth that the film began with is trampled over until it barely flickers amid the chaos.

The action in the film's second half is suitably intense and well-executed but it has absolutely no place in a film that starts off the way "District 9" does. Furthermore, the non-documentary footage is shot in handheld, as well, seemingly to blur the lines between the two styles. It renders the film schizophrenic.

Van De Merwe's arc as a character slightly mitigates the sloppiness. Shortly after being exposed to the device, he is subjected to a truly perverse series of experiments that mark a momentary return to the documentary footage and easily the most emotional moments of the film. Later, when he finally decides to stand up for himself, the ensuing assault is extremely cathartic. He, however, ultimately proves to have selfish motivations. One could argue that his progression is designed to ironically mirror the humans' actions against the aliens, but his plotline is marred with so much pining for his wife and stilted heroism that it is difficult to divine a message from it all.

That is not to mention all of the popping going on. If Blomkamp were not a human himself, I would wonder if he hated us, portraying so many human misdeeds and then climaxing with a series of relentlessly gory killings. By the end of the film, in fact, there is little question that the humans are thoroughly petty and violent people. The aliens, on the other hand, are very well animated and elicit quite a bit of an emotional response, especially because the film focuses on a father and son who are simply trying to get home. Yet, the film ends on a strikingly romantic note between humans and the aliens get their pound of flesh (literally), as well. Thus, the film even fails to be cohesive on a thematic level.

It is hard to say what would have made "District 9" work. For the sake of cohesion, Blomkamp really should have committed to either a documentary format or a dramatic one. Yet, if he had gone with the former, effectively driving the story through a character's actions would have been nearly impossible ("Cloverfield" proved this) and, if he had done the latter, the film's best moments would never have come to be. Blomkamp, and his co-writer, Terri Tatchell, did not write a script that suited the type of film he wished to make. It results in a fractured film that is half brilliant and half decent, with each half being dragged down by the other.

What makes "District 9" so frustrating is not that it squanders an excellent premise, but that it is wildly successful, up until a certain point. Likewise, the action film that it transforms into is hardly bad, either; it is simply out of place. In short, "District 9" is two stilted films in one.

Boldly Going Nowhere Particularly Interesting

Oh, J. J. Abrams. If the sci-fi world is a battlefield, you're packing the biggest Nerf gun in your platoon. Travelling at "warp speed" and "reinvigorating the franchise" with "slam-bang, kick your mother in the face" action, J. J. Abrams' new "Star Trek" is tearing up the box office these days.

I have no idea why.

Do not misunderstand me: The film holds a special place in my heart. Never before has a movie allowed my mind to wander during its climactic final battle. J. J. Abrams has pretty much mastered the mediocre. I found myself caring almost as little in his last attempt, "Mission Impossible III." The man does not patently suck like, say, Michael Bay does but he certainly draws from the same bag of tricks. "Star Trek" is rife with ridiculously elaborate special effects, melodramatic close ups and slick, "How many lens flares can we fit in one shot?" cinematography. Given the popularity of this movie with critics, however, it may be more insidious than Michael Bay's typical shenanigans.

Blame the screenwriters for that. For, where J. J. Abrams is mediocre, Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman are plain dumb. The only real achievement these two have made with "Star Trek" is the impressive feat of convolution that prevents the film from stepping all over the original "Star Trek" universe. Who, though, really gives a shit? If the movie was any good, trekkers would not be in any place to bitch about changing things and, the way things turned out, it seems like the entirety of the plot centers on explaining this continuity loophole. This could explain why the movie felt like little more than a first act. The first two hours are all set up, then (oh yeah) the bad guy falls down a giant tube. That's not a movie; it's a really long commercial for the sequel... that you pay to watch.

The note about the giant tube brings me to my next point: Is this really "Star Trek?" As I was watching a smug pretty-boy getting chased around an ice planet by a giant monster, I genuinely believed that, instead of a "Star Trek" reboot, I was watching the best "Star Wars" prequel yet. As a continuation of the "Star Trek" franchise, however, this movie is as limp as they come. There is not a shred of science to be found here (lots of sparkly production design, but no science). The new Starfleet is not convincing as a military organization for a second, with recruits constantly mouthing off to superiors and hooking up with each other in the elevators. More importantly, there are not any real ideas fueling the film; the writers clearly find hormonal idiocy more interesting than real drama.

The original "Star Trek" series was rife with social commentary. The casting itself made a bold statement about the type of ideas the franchise pursued. The introduction of color television gained a bit of symbolic value as the Enterprise's unabashedly multicultural crew changed the way TV looked. "Star Trek" presented an Earth where our cultures had fully accepted one another, but faced a new challenge: relating to people from other worlds. It was potent stuff and it made the series great. So, what did Kurtzman and Orci do with it? They made Chekov's Russian accent a punchline and they made Sulu do flips while fighting with a ninja sword. Critics seem to love how Uhura has been developed. She used to do little more than look pretty and answer the phones. What about the new and improved Uhura? She runs around in her bra and has heightened "oral sensitivity." My, how far we've come.

That is not to take away from the quality of the cast. Chris Pine makes the snotty, new Captain Kirk far more likable than expected. Zachary Quinto does Spock justice, even if the writers fail to develop him in any compelling way. The rest of the crew admirably emulates their predecessors, despite getting little opportunity to do more. Perhaps they are the reason Paramount has gotten so lucky with this one. (The special effects may have something to do with it, as well.) If Abrams and his lazy writers are replaced for the inevitable sequel (highly unlikely), it may be a worthwhile film. Until then, I think I will wait for the "I Love Lucy" reboot. I hear they are getting Roland Emmerich to do it.