SUMMERTIME BRAIN-TEASERS

Inception Leonardo DiCaprio If summer's typical bouquet consists of green grass, barbecue and a touch of sea breeze, the indoor equivalent must be a cinema house's whiff of fresh popcorn and stale air-conditioning. Box-office wisdom dictates that audiences gravitate toward extremes during the warmer months, preferring to end lazy days at the beach with jacked-up, stunt-heavy action thrillers like "Salt" and "Inception", films which opened this season in America at #2 and #1 respectively.

Another hallmark of summer flicks? Hollywood stars. Although Angelina Jolie and Leonardo DiCaprio technically play characters in each film, what their roles actually offer is the opportunity to play out enhanced versions of their public selves. In Jolie's case, we get a resilient and enigmatic international megababe; in DiCaprio's case, a stoically wounded Everyman with the soul of an artist. Both are dreamy.

Whatever the critics thought of the films, they agree on the star factor. New York's David Edelstein called "Salt" a "senseless blast," but concedes that what the movie "lacks in coherence in makes up in centrifugal force." Namely, Jolie. A.O. Scott concurred, calling Jolie the "prime special effect, and a reminder that even in an era of technological overkill, movie stars matter." For his part, DiCaprio's Dom in "Inception" (reviewed here in The Economist) is the kind of sensitive and private man that a young cinemagoer might understand as "deep". DiCaprio has lent a similar mood to previous characters in films like "Shutter Island", "The Aviator" and "Titanic", all the way back to "Romeo + Juliet". This isn't to say that Jolie and DiCaprio are one-trick ponies, just that they bring certain essential traits to every project (like all true film stars) and are therefore incapable of disappearing into a role. It's a mixed blessing.

Big-ticket actors aside, "Salt" and "Inception" have something else in common—that is, a will to befuddle. Both films tack their action sequences, of which there are plenty, to a twisty central concept. "Salt" asks the question of whether Jolie is a double agent or not. "Inception" asks whether DiCaprio is dreaming or not. In describing "Inception", Slate's Dana Stevens invoked M.C. Escher while David Denby name-checked Luis Buñuel. Elsewhere "Salt" brought comparisons to John le Carré and the Bourne franchise. To suggest that either film has an intellectual gloss is putting it too strongly, but they do offer greater water-cooler fodder than, say, last year's action blockbusters (see: "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" and "Terminator Salvation"). Making my way out of the cinema after each film, I was surrounded by viewers posing variations of the question that circulated in my head: "What was that all about?"

If such puzzlement isn't exactly rigorous, it's fun enough for 120 minutes (or 150 in the case of "Inception"). A viewer doesn't often escape the sense that her intelligence has been grossly underestimated by filmmakers these days. The finest entertainment of late is made for the small screen (as we've been reminded of with the return of "Mad Men"). Still, until Hollywood offers films as ingenious and captivating as what's available on television, brainteasers like "Salt" and "Inception" will do just fine.

~ MOLLY YOUNG