Ryan Groat Movie Scene Written Report

Describe the scene: Our group chose a scene from the 2010 film Inception. Cobb goes to the French university where Miles, his father in law, works. He is in need of a new architect, somebody who can design the dream world for Cobbs next mission. At first, Miles objects to the fact that Cobb is there to corrupt one of his students. After Cobb reveals that successful completion of his next mission would allow him to go home and see his children, Miles relents. 1. Apply all 8 elements of interpersonal communication to your scene. The sourcereceiver pair consists of Cobb and Miles. The encoding-decoding pair was Cobb, who argued his point to Miles, who was attempting to understand why he should help his son in law. The message is that Cobb will likely never be allowed back into America to see his children again if he is not able to complete this job, as he is a fugitive from justice. Miles sends the message back that although he is reluctant to do so, he will help Cobb for the good of his grandchildren. The discussion is face to face via a vocal-auditory channel. There is a good deal of noise present in the conversation, as Miles is originally quite reluctant to help Cobb due to the notions he holds about Cobbs profession and failed relationship with his daughter. The meeting takes place in Miles university classroom, which is the physical context. The temporal context is vaguely present day. Miles relationship with Cobb has been strained due to his daughters suicide after being caught up in a dream world with

Cobb. The cultural context is that Cobb is American and Miles is from Britain, which are both individualistic cultures. The ethics displayed in this scene are questionable. Cobb is asking Miles to involve a third party in an illegal enterprise to further his own goals. In the end, Miles compliance is also unethical. Cobb displays extreme competence in the art of persuasion, as he gets Miles to completely reverse his original inclination after laying out his talking points. 2. How do we see one of the 7 principles of communication used in this scene? The principle that I chose is that Interpersonal Communication is Purposeful. Miles must learn about why Cobb is in his classroom and why he should lend his help. In order to make his decision, Miles must relate to Cobbs position and understand his options. Cobb is there in an attempt to influence Miles using his children as the crucial leverage. The dream worlds that both characters have traversed can be a form of play when they arent actively working. In the end, Miles decides to help Cobb and voices the fact that hes got the perfect candidate for the job. 3. Were your characters from individualistic or collectivist cultures? Explain how their cultures affected the way they acted towards each other. Cobb is from the United States and Miles is from England, though he resides in France during the scene. They are both from individualistic cultures, though the end result would have likely been the same if they had been from a collectivist culture where the family is highly valued. 4. What is a stereotype and what stereotypes are present in your scene? The definition of a stereotype is a fixed impression of a group of people. Cobb uses his

stereotype of what a grandfather should act like to formulate his argument. Miles may have an impression that Americans are headstrong and stubborn as well. 5. Apply the four parts of the Johari Window to one of the characters in your scene. Cobb is a well-dressed man during the scene, which is apparent to all and is his open self. His blind self is that he is losing grip with reality, which Miles recognizes quite clearly but Cobb himself cannot see. Cobbs hidden self is that he cannot keep his dead wife out of his dreams, but this is something he doesnt tell anybody. His unknown self is that he has it in him to forgive himself for the death of his wife and let go of her memory. He confronts her projection in the dream world later in the movie and does this. 6. What is a self-serving bias, and explain how one character used it in your scene. Self-serving bias is when you are harder on other people than you are on yourself for doing the same thing. Cobb exhibits this in the scene when he blames Miles dream training partially on his current troubles. However, Cobbs plan is to train somebody in much the same fashion to do the same job that he once did. 7. How could your characters have increased the accuracy of their impression formation? Miles could have analyzed his impressions to make sure that he didnt come to any early conclusions before Cobb had fully stated his point. Cobb could have checked to see if Miles was interested in helping him without using his children as leverage. Miles could have reduced uncertainty by asking Cobb more questions about the job he was about to embark on. Cobb could have respected Miles culture as a college professor more. 8. Apply all five stages of the process of listening to the scene in your movie. Miles receives the message that Cobb wants his help. He understands that without his help,

Cobb is unlikely to ever return to the United States to see his children again. Miles remembers that Cobb is in a highly dangerous, morally ambiguous and illegal line of work. He evaluates Cobbs proposal and looks for alternatives. Finally, he responds by telling Cobb that he will, in fact, help him. 9. Name a listening barrier you saw and explain how it affected your scene. In the scene, Miles is biased and prejudiced against the profession that Cobb has fallen into. He steals ideas from people, and the idea of thievery is unappealing to Miles. He does not want to encourage another one of his students to get into a life of crime. 10. Based on what weve learned in our class, how could communication have been improved in this scene? In the minute or so that leads up to Cobbs proposal, he makes almost no eye contact while he goes almost as far as accusing Miles of being the cause of his current predicament. When Miles pleads with Cobb to return to reality, Cobb is listening to him but doesnt really hear him. Instead, Cobb uses the term reality to turn the argument around onto Miles.