Christopher Nolan has made a career out of confusing movie theater audiences.
The films Nolan and his writing partner/brother Jonathan have made are anything but straightforward— they can all be interpreted in muiltiple ways, and feature countless twists and turns (except maybe"The Dark Knight" series). This has become a staple of Nolan's work and fans expect it.
The ending to "Inception" is still a source of conflict among movie lovers, even thought Nolan has completed three projects since its 2010 release. The completely open-ended final scene leaves the decision of whether or not Leonardo DiCaprio's character Dominic Cobb is dreaming directly up to the audience.
Throughout the movie, which focuses on lucid dreaming (a topic that lends itself to plenty of confusion), Cobb has a totem that lets him know if he is awake. The spinning item naturally is a vital part of every scene it is in, most notably the final one where the screen cuts to black before revealing if Cobb's reunion with his children is happening in his mind or not.
At the Tribeca Film Festival earlier this week, Nolan was involved in a Q&A, and according to Business Insider, one fan confronted the director on the cliffhanging end to "Inception." Rather than giving everyone who has ever seen the movie what they want, Nolan lectured on why he will never explain the endings to any of his works.
BI reports that he did this by telling a story about the premiere of another one of his biggest films, "Memento," in 2000. Just like "Inception," "Memento" succeeds, in stunning fashion, at blurring the line between time and reality.
"We got a very, very excited reaction to it," Nolan said. "Somebody had asked about my interpretation of the ending and I said 'Well, it's all up to the audience but this is what it means to me,' and I gave them in great detail what exactly the ambiguities of the film meant to me," Nolan said.
Following the explanation, Nolan said his brother cautioned him to never again reveal an ending to one of their films.
"You don't understand, nobody hears that first bit where you say it's really up to the viewers if you then give your interpretation," Jonathan said.
Nolan said that was "the last time I ever opened my mouth."
He is hardly the only director, in film or television, that makes cerebral thrillers, but Nolan is the most prominent. Even if viewers will never know the official meanings to the ends of his films, Nolan is so successful at what he does that they will always come back for more.
