When Christopher Nolan Opened Up About His Initial Concept For Inception: “I Started With A…”

Christopher Nolan once revealed that he began writing Inception as a heist film, only to add an emotional narrative.

By
Vivek Kumar
- April 5, 2025 | 7:54 PM IST
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Oscar-winning filmmaker Christopher Nolan is renowned for his complex yet nuanced storylines. Nolan has released several blockbusters in theatres, and one of his most acclaimed movies continues to be Inception.

The film, which was released in 2010 and starred Leonardo DiCaprio as the lead, expanded the horizons of cinema in a true sense by presenting the fascinating story of Dom Cobb. However, the maker of the film revealed that he primarily began writing Inception as a mere heist film.

Christopher Nolan told WIRED, “The problem was that I started with a heist film structure. At the time, that seemed the best way of getting all the exposition into the beginning of the movie.” The filmmaker soon realized that a heist film is largely unemotional and tends to be “deliberately superficial.”

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This pushed Christopher Nolan to go ahead and add a much-needed emotional layer to the film, which resonated perfectly with the story. “I wanted to deal with the world of dreams, and I realized that I really had to offer the audience a more emotional narrative, something that represents the emotional world of somebody’s mind. So both the hero’s story and the heist itself had to be based on emotional concepts,” he stated.

However, it was easier said than done, as it took the Oppenheimer creator nearly a decade to figure out the perfect script that blended both story elements. In his conversation with Deadline, Nolan further discussed the writing process of Inception, sharing that he tries to jump into the story and imagine the world around it as an audience to get a subjective understanding.

Christopher Nolan emphasized building an emotional connection with the central character to generate a resonating script. At one point, he relied on using diagrams to get a better objective view of the story. The filmmaker insisted on adopting both approaches to deliver a clear yet emotionally rich storyline.

For more such stories, check out Hollywood News

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