I seem to have some people who take issue me my "overrated" claim, so I will elaborate for your benefit. It's not a terrible film, if I was forced to choose between good or bad I'd even argue for the former, so I didn't want to chime in and dishonestly claim that it sucked. Hence the term "overrated".
The problem is there is just nothing exceptional about this film. It really doesn't belong in this discussion, it's not a film that is open to much subjectivity so there shouldn't be a niche who appreciate it above others.
Nor is it a franchise and/or built upon another medium, it's a better film than the LotR saga but I can understand why someone who choose that as their favorite film. Weaker then Empire Strikes back though in my opinion.
I think the fan fare is due to the highly manipulative nature of the narrative, the dumb, dumb portrayal of morality and sappy sentimentalism. It's disappointing but if a fraudulent, pusedao intellectual project like Inception can get so much love it shouldn't really surprise.
A personally criticism I would have is it fails to make use of the uniqueness of the film medium such as Vertigo or 2001.
But even forgetting all that, the film completely falls flat near the ending after blowing the logical conclusion point. When Dufresne is missing from his cell and the tunnel is discovered hidden behind a poster, it should end with that scene. The fifteen minutes of contrived tripe that follows only serves to deteriorate from the viewing experience.
