Ellen Page’s dream job
FOR ELLEN PAGE, working on one of this summer’s most anticipated films was, in every sense of the term, a dream gig. Even if you’ve seen the trailers and TV spots, the Halifax actor says you can’t really prepare for director-writer Christopher Nolan’s sci-fi thriller Inception when it opens July 16.
For one thing, it’s one of the few mega-budget offerings from a major studio that isn’t based on a previous movie, a familiar pop culture property or Tom Cruise’s toothy grin.
For another, it’s from a filmmaker who - when he’s not busy revamping the Batman franchise with a Brit’s taste for grit and gloom - takes great pains to confound and surprise viewers with original movies like Memento and The Prestige.
With Inception, Nolan was given carte blanche to barrel through the doors of perception and dive into the subconscious with his team of Leonardo DiCaprio-led industrial espionage experts who get their secrets by invading the dreams of their targets.
Page has stuck to indie films with strong character parts since making X-Men: The Last Stand, the third film in the Marvel Comics mutant series, but she knew as soon as she got the script that Inception would not be your everyday blockbuster.
"I was just absolutely exhilarated," says Page from the Beverly Hills Hilton, in the midst of last weekend’s promo junket for the Warner Brothers big-screen and Imax mind-bender.
"At first, there were a lot of questions as I’m reading the first few pages and trying to figure out what’s going on, and all of a sudden I realized I was absolutely immersed in it.
"By the time there was only a few pages left, it was almost like unconsciously everything had just been tied together, and that’s just a testament to the incredible script that Chris wrote."
Page’s role in all of this is Ariadne, an architecture student in Paris recruited by "extractor" Dom Cobb (DiCaprio) to design and manipulate the dreamscapes they infiltrate. Described as curious and eager to learn, Ariadne’s name is a nod to the Crete princess who helped Theseus navigate the labyrinth and slay the Minotaur, and in Inception "becomes a guide for the audience, to keep everything on track."
Imagine if cerebral science fiction author Philip K. Dick wrote a high-concept heist movie, and you wouldn’t be far off the mark with Inception. Page says the film gets to the heart of the human psyche and "brings up real intense, existentialist questions that I know I think about a lot," making us think not just about the fleeting glimpses into our subconscious offered by dreams, but also the elusive quality of life in the waking world.
"You can’t pick something that’s more universal and mysterious than dreams," she says.
"It’s something everybody does, no matter where you are or what your income is. And yet it’s something we know very little about, so here’s this incredibly universal concept that goes right into the idea of the potential of the human mind and the possibilities of the human mind to be explored."
To create his dream world, Nolan, his crew and a cast that also includes Michael Caine, Marion Cotillard and Joseph Gordon-Levitt, assembled on elaborate sets in a former dirigible hangar north of London and locations in France, Japan, Morocco and Alberta, while accommodating the director’s preference for practical special effects that are created largely on camera rather than in a computer.
So Page found herself immersed in water, riding in a van that spins 360 degrees and sitting in the middle of an explosion at a Parisian cafe with DiCaprio, a few metres away from cars that are flipping and air cannons blowing debris into the air while trying not to react.
"I actually really enjoy getting to do more of the physical, stunt-like activities," says the petite performer, who earned her share of bruises in the roller derby drama Whip It. "But I had nothing compared to Joe (Gordon-Levitt) and what he did in his amazing hallway fight sequence.
"Whenever you’re an actor and you get to do something that you’re a part of and you’re immersed in, of course there’s going to be a completely different response and feeling, and that’s going to transcend to the audience. If there’s an actor and he’s in front of a green screen doing a sequence, it’s going to look flawless, but in his scene Joe slips and he scrambles, and it really grabs hold of the audience. These people aren’t perfect, and they’re in this really chaotic situation, and things go wrong like they always do."
Later this year, Page will be seen in more low-key action scenes in the comedy Super, as the sidekick to her Juno co-star Rainn Wilson, who plays an average guy tackling crime in his community as a homemade superhero. She’s also working with cable giant HBO, appearing in the drama Tilda with Diane Keaton and nearing the pilot stage for the 20-something comedy series Stitch N’ Bitch, which she’s producing with friends Alia Shawkat (also in Whip It) and Sean Tillmann (a.k.a. musician Har Mar Superstar).
"It’s moving along well, and I’m really excited about working with HBO because I absolutely love what they do," says Page. "I feel pretty psyched about it. I’m loving writing."
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