

Inception Explained – HTML + CSS Experiment - msohcw
http://www.inception-explained.com/

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trevelyan
I love Inception (a genuine masterpiece), but wish people paid less attention
to the details of the plot and more attention to the literary subtext! Because
the plot is very straightforward, while understanding why the film is
structured the way it is (and why Nolan does smaller things like naming the
children as they are), is a genuine revelation.

~~~
gingerjoos
> understanding why the film is structured the way it is (and why Nolan does
> smaller things like naming the children as they are), is a genuine
> revelation

Could you expand on that? I had to google for the names - Philippa and James.
What is the relevance?

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bertzzie
See his post on previous thread:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3736009>

~~~
trevelyan
Thanks for digging up the link. Evidence I post far too much about Inception.
:)

~~~
bornhuetter
Interesting interpretation. When I saw it, I assumed the metaphors were
primarily to Greek mythology (calling Ellen Page's character Ariadne being the
obvious tip-off) or at least a mix of mythologies. Do you mind me asking if
you are personally a Christian?

~~~
trevelyan
I'd be curious what other myths you spotted, because the reference to Ariadne
is certainly an allusion to the Greek myth you mention. Just as her namesake
there guided Theseus from the labyrinth, Ariadne's role in Inception is
guiding Cobb out of the maze that is the mortal world. This why we get casual
dialogue about characters "getting lost" in limbo and "spending a lifetime"
down there. According to the logic of the film, life is a dream and all dreams
are mazes.

More neat things about Ariadne's character: she is a gift from his father
("ask and ye shall receive") and one of the first things she does is the very
symbolic act of shattering a pair of mirrors which trap Cobb in another maze
of sorts. Also, considering her thematic purpose, it is interesting to note
that she is the single character who accompanies Cobb to the gates of
immigration, wearing a sweater that appears to be made of red yarn.

On the Christian front, I was raised as a soft Anglican so I hope I know
enough not to be wildly wrong. That said, the first thing that clicked for me
watching the film was the secular symbolism. When Nolan pointed his camera at
the ocean while the narrator intoned about "the shores of our subconscious" it
jolted me to attention as water is a common symbol for the subconscious in a
great deal of English literature and film, and Nolan uses it in this very
conventional way throughout Inception. The Christian references are
omnipresent but subtle ("leap of faith", "goddamn beach", etc.) and the
sandcastle bit didn't fall into place until much later, when I caught James'
line of dialogue thanks to watching the film in a theater with subtitles, and
then made the connection to the collapsing buildings of limbo and the
sandcastles after the fact.

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sneak
This is whatever the 2013 equivalent of "requires flash" is.

> HEY THERE! INCEPTION-EXPLAINED.COM IS AN EXPERIMENTAL SITE WHICH USES
> INTERACTIVE SCROLLING TO ANIMATE THE PAGE. UNFORTUNATELY, AWESOME MOBILE
> DEVICES LIKE YOURS DON'T HANDLE THAT VERY WELL :( PLEASE DO CHECK IT OUT ON
> YOUR COMPUTER USING CHROME OR FIREFOX, I LIKE TO THINK IT'S WORTH IT!

~~~
edu
But as far as this is an experiment, I don't see any problem. It would be a
problem if this tried to be a general purpose site.

~~~
unimpressive
Eh, there was no reason to _assume_ somebodies mobile phone was incapable of
scroll. That's just making their decision for them.

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killahpriest
It's not that the phone is incapable of scroll, it's that the phone is
guaranteed to freeze up and not render the site properly on that page. But,
even if the phone could handle the computation necessary to display the site,
the author probably did not design a version that is easy to use on tiny
screens.

~~~
chii
> the author probably did not design a version that is easy to use on tiny
> screens.

true, but they should let the user be the judge of that, and have a button to
allow it to press on and disregard the user agent.

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guynamedloren
Posted a while back: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3735039>

~~~
msohcw
Whoops. Never saw that. My bad. I just got linked to it and thought it was
pretty interesting.

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jmcdonald-ut
This didn't work with my scroll wheel very well. Once I just grabbed the
scroll bar, I had some better luck. It looks neat though, I just suggest
making it so the scroll wheel is more graceful.

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johnpolacek
Inception Explained uses Scrollorama, my jQuery plugin for doing scrolling
animation. I have an updated version of this plugin, Scrollorama2:
SuperScrollorama:

<http://johnpolacek.github.com/superscrollorama/>

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jpswade
I found trying to follow this a more difficult experience than watching the
actual film.

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shoopy
It's neat, but flicking my scrollwheel that many times gave me RSI. :)

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unimpressive
Thankfully I have a trackball mouse, or that scrolling probably would have
been really awkward. (It didn't feel right with arrow keys, too much latency.)

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culshaw
Would be much better with some click based animation rather than scrolling to
give this parallax effect.

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josscrowcroft
Beautiful - now if somebody can just make one of these for _Primer_ I'll be
all set.

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elango
nice try, good graphics, but i still find it confusing and boring after a few
pulls.

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hayksaakian
Scrolling on my N7 was a hit and miss experience

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jimsilverman
this is a lot more interesting than the actual movie.

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andymcsherry
Too many spoilers for someone that hasn't seen the movie. I doubt your
affiliate link will get much traction because of it.

~~~
AgentConundrum
Why would you click on something called "Inception Explained" if you haven't
seen the movie?

Also, what's the problem with someone using an Amazon affiliate link to help
pay for their site / earn some income from the work they put into the site?

