Directed by:
Rian JohnsonScreenplay:
Rian JohnsonCinematography:
Steve YedlinComposer:
Nathan JohnsonCast:
Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis, Emily Blunt, Paul Dano, Jeff Daniels, Piper Perabo, Noah Segan, David Jensen, Jeff Chase, Garret Dillahunt, Marcus Hester (more)VOD (3)
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In the futuristic action thriller Looper, time travel will be invented – but it will be illegal and only available on the black market. When the mob wants to get rid of someone, they will send their target 30 years into the past, where a "looper" – a hired gun, like Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) – is waiting to mop up. Joe is getting rich and life is good... until the day the mob decides to “close the loop", sending back Joe’s future self (Bruce Willis) for assassination. (official distributor synopsis)
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Looper is a solidly thought out and well-shot and narrated "semi-indie" sci-fi film, which actually only takes a proven foundation and adds nothing new to it. So if you've seen "time travel" classics like Donnie Darko or 12 Monkeys (or The Butterfly Effect and others), it will become clear to you in the middle of the film that someone who returns from the future to fix the past tends to find out that his actions are part of the events he seeks to prevent. And unfortunately, the film goes along these tracks without any surprises and any significant excitement. After a fairly fresh introduction, an overly sleepy passage comes in the second half, which tries to motivate the rebirth of the hero's younger self. It makes sense, it doesn't offend, but at the same time it's not a big deal - rather a solidly written conversation film. Johnson works a lot with the characters, less with the world, which is more so sketched out (one must wonder why it's full of trailer trash, why people are so disgusting to each other and why there is a Zen oasis on the other half of the globe). Willis' storyline brings more adrenaline, but also shallow poses, awkward action and love clichés. The two selves meet in an excellent scene in a bistro, but then they each go their down their own storylines until the loop closes. Looper confirms the trend of "intelligent genre films with a lower budget" (Source Code, The Adjustment Bureau, Moon, In Time), which surpass the mainstream with their ambition and authorial vision. But they almost always lack an essential piece in order to achieve perfection. Most likely the piece that would significantly disrupt the well-known genre rules - it is best described by Willis, who, when mentioning a complex time paradox, says something to his younger self in the sense of: "We would have to sit here overnight and draw on piles of napkins. Just believe that things are this way." In the end, the trap is not unlike the one in which their more expensive friends hang. [75%]
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Bruce Willis is able to time travel much better that this (hello 12 Monkeys). Looper is another one of those new sci-fi films (Moon, Source Code, In Time...) where it's nice to see that they can get by without a huge budget and that they can raise the hopes of genre lovers that they'll be original and fresh... But that's the end of it. In this case I liked the initial idea, the technical execution and both actors (Joseph Gordon-Levitt handled the role of Bruce Willis quite well, he wasn't even very ridiculous), but the rest wasn't worth much. Continually stupid and illogical, the clichéd passage on the farm makes me want to kill someone, and worst of all was the ending, in which - SPOILER - the hero died, but his inner voice kept on talking.
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Complicated, narratively muddled, and considerably unpolished. The director didn't even understand the basic thing that if you have a low-budget sci-fi film, you can't afford panoramic shots or city and traffic scenes, because if in 2044 you see a Toyota Yaris driving on the road, that's probably not entirely right. Only the smaller role of Emily Blunt and the excellently stylized Joseph Gordon-Levitt are good, he perfectly captures not only the appearance of a young Bruce Willis, but also his facial expressions and delivers great looks and lines precisely in his younger style, and it works great. Not a timeless film for sure, not very high-quality either, rather unusual, perhaps, but that's not enough.
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The greatest strength of the rough futuristic junkyard is in the confident echo it leaves behind. It was running through my mind even long after I left the cinema, I kept thinking about the individual plot lines, and my joy is mostly spoiled by the fact that the more I ponder, the more logical inconsistencies and paradoxes I find. That said, thanks to the perfect casting with the unwavering Bruce Willis at the forefront, it is a joy to watch this genre mix. The sympathetically uncompromising form makes it easier to overlook the narrative errors. 70% and rounding up for Rian Johnson's undeniable courage.
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A Terminator wannabe and the stupidest science fiction movie among the intelligent ones. Longwinded; after the opening few minutes completely without ideas; set in the future only for effect; it is shamefully superficial, it has no rules (neither for time travel nor the simple laws of action/reaction; for instance, the reason behind getting rid of people in such a complex, costly and uncertain way, which it later completely denies), but it has the most annoying child around... It wouldn't matter with a dumb popcorn action movie, but with a movie supposedly based on its "smartness", it makes you want to slap the filmmakers in the face. So there are precisely two pros; the opening quarter of an hour before the well of ideas dries out, and Willis’ dialog-less scene at the first meeting. Just disappointing. And yet it's the best non-action science fiction since Source Code. Which is darn sad.
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